Loralynn Kennakris 2: The Morning Which Breaks (57 page)

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Authors: Owen R. O'Neill,Jordan Leah Hunter

Tags: #Science Fiction & Fantasy, #Science Fiction, #Adventure, #Military, #Space Fleet, #Space Marine

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Index of Terms

[
A
]   [
B
]   [
C
]   [
D
]   [
E
]   [
F
]   [
G
]   [
H
]   [
I
]   [
J
]   [
K
]   [
L
]   [
M
]   [
N
]   [
O
]   [
P
]   [
Q
]   [
R
]   [
S
]   [
T
]   [
U
]   [
V
]   [
W
]   [
X
]   [
Y
]   [
Z
]

 
A

Action, (military)
||
Admiralty, the
||
After Action Report, (AAR)
||
AGI/AGE
||
AI
||
Aide-de-camp
||
Alecto Initiative, the
||
Amalekites
||
ANCAP
||
Andaman & Nicobar
||
Anson’s Deep, Battle of
||
Anson’s Deep, Nexus
||
Antigua
||
AP
||
APS
||
Archon
||
Area Defense
||
ARGONET
||
Asylum
||
AU

 
B

Ballast, in
||
Bannermans
||
Battalion
||
Bearing
||
Bells
||
Belt, the
||
Billet
||
Black Army
||
BMC
||
BOQ
||
Bosun
||
Bot
||
Brevet Rank
||
Brigade
||
Brigadier

 
C

C-12
||
C4ISR
||
Caelius Protogenos
||
Call-Sign Alphabet
||
Canteen
||
CAP
||
Capperbar
||
Captain of the Fleet
||
CAT
||
CEF
||
CEO
||
Cepheus Region
||
CGHQ
||
Chain gun
||
Charted Space
||
Chief
||
CIC
||
CID
||
CinC
||
Clouds
||
Clubs,
||
CNO
||
CO
||
Colonization Periods
||
COMINT
||
Commodore
||
Company
||
Conning Officer
||
Contact Binary
||
Core Systems
||
Cornet
||
Corps
||
Council of Ministers
||
CPA
||
Crucis Sector
||
Crysteel
||
CWO
||
Cygnus Sector

 
D

Dark Clouds
||
DCID
||
Deneb Sector
||
DIO
||
Division
||
Dog Watches
||
Double-Hatted
||
Dragonfly
||
DSI
||
DSRO
||
DSZ
||
Dueling Cultures

 
E

E-boost
||
ECA
||
ECM
||
ELINT
||
Eltanin Sector
||
EMP
||
Epona
||
ESM
||
EVA
||
EW
||
EWO
||
Ex gratia
||
Exec

 
F

Fighter Boss
||
Fireteam
||
FITREP
||
Flag Lieutenant
||
Flag Officer
||
Fleet Captain
||
Flight Officer
||
Flotilla
||
Forbes-Dyson
||
Formation Wars, the
||
FORPRO
||
Free Space
||
FTL

 
G

Galatea
||
GAT
||
General Quarters, (GQ)
||
General Staff (CEF)
||
General Staff (Royal Navy, New UK)
||
Geriatrics, postpausal
||
Grand Senate
||
Gravitational Exclusion Zone
||
Grav-Plant
|| ‘
Guest Labor
’ ||
Gunroom

 
H

H&K Sats
||
Halith
||
Harkness
||
Head Money
||
Helmsmen
||
Hesperia
||
Hestia
||
Hive
||
Home Fleet(s)
||
Homeworlds
||
HQ
||
HUD
||
HUMINT
||
Huygens’ Gap
||
Hydra Region

 
I

I&W
||
IADS
||
IFF
||
IHS
||
Ilmatar Neoforming
||
Immunocytes
||
Interstellar Space
||
IO
||
Iona
||
IPS
||
IRIS
||
ISS
||
IT
||
IW

 
J

Janin Station
||
JCS
||
Jig

 
K

Karelia
||
Kepler Junction
||
Kiloklicks
||
Kips
||
KKHR Control Group
||
Klicks

 
L

League-Halith Wars
||
Letter of Marque
||
Lictors
||
Line officers
||
Linked Command System
||
Lixae
||
LMAC
||
LSS
||
Lunar 1

 
M

||
Manifolds
||
Maniple
||
Marines
||
Mars
||
Mars Air Line
||
Maser
||
Match Code
||
Maxor
||
Megs
||
Meridies Cluster
||
Merope Junction
||
Mess
||
Messier
||
MI-6 Assault Rifle
||
Micro-manufacturing Revolution
||
Mips
||
Miranda
||
Modern terraforming
||
Monitors
||
MOU
||
Mules & Mule Trains
||
Mule Killers
||
Music

 
N

Nanocyte Revolutions
||
Nanotech
||
Navy, CEF
||
Navy, Halith
||
NCA
||
NCO
||
NDIA
||
Nedaema
||
Nereidian League
||
Neutronium
||
New California
||
New Madras
||
New Meridies
||
New UK, the
||
Nexus
||
Novaya Zemlya
||
Novaya Zemlya, Battle of
||
Number 1

 
O

Omnisynth
||
ONI
||
OOD
||
Op
||
OPREP
||
Ordinary
||
OTC
[1] ||
OTC
[2] ||
Outbound Station
||
Outworlds
||
Outworlds Border Zone

 
P

PACRIM, the
||
Parsec
||
Parson’s Acre
||
Passing the Word
||
Pathfinder
||
PCA
||
PFC
||
Phaedra
||
Phase-conjugate Mirror
||
Pilot
||
Pilot Officer
||
Platoon
||
Pleiades, the
||
Plenary Council
||
Point Defense
||
Porte, The
||
Premier
||
Primary
||
Privateer
||
Prize Money
||
Proconsul
||
Proxenoi Council
||
Purser

 
Q

Quark diamond
||
Quartermaster

 
R

Racks
||
Railguns
||
Rates
||
RCS
||
Readiness Conditions
||
Regiment
||
Regulus
||
Rejuvenants
||
Rephidim
||
RF
||
Rho Ceti Principate
||
Rigel Kent
||
Rip
||
ROEs
||
Rouge Nanocytes
||
RST

 
S

SAARs
||
SAW
||
Scholiast, the
||
SCO
||
SECNAV
||
Seconded
||
Section
||
SIG
||
SIGINT
||
Signal Lieutenant (CEF)
||
SITREP
||
Skeer
||
Skye
||
Slave Federations
||
SOC
||
SOCOM
||
SOFOR
||
Sol Local Group
||
SOLCOM
||
SOP
||
Speaker, the
||
SPEC-Ops
||
Squad
||
Squadron
||
SRF
||
SSO
||
Staff, (military)
||
Star Civilization
||
Star Nation
||
Starclipper
||
Starling
||
Starship
||
STO
||
Strange matter
||
Strength deck
||
Strike Force, CEF Navy
||
Strike Rangers, CEF Marine Corps
||
Substantive Rank
||
Sultanate, the
||
Supreme Staff (Halith)
||
Sutlers
||
Synalogue, the

 
T

TAO
||
Task Force, Naval
||
Task Group, Naval
||
Tau Verde
||
TBD
||
TDY
||
TEARs
||
Terebellum Empire
||
Terra, Terran
||
Tesseract
||
Theme
||
Think-Linking
||
Tier-1 Colony
||
Tier-2 Colony
||
Traditions, Naval
||
Trifid Frontier Force
||
Trifid Region
||
Troubles, The
||
T-Synth
||
Tycho Prime
||
Tyrsenians

 
U

Uncle
||
UWB

 
V

Vaccines, Proactive
||
Vectura Networks
||
Venus
||
Victualler
||
VRSN

 
W

War Week
||
Wardroom
||
Watch Standers
||
Watches
||
WCO
||
WCS
||
WO
||
Wogan’s Reef

 
X

XO

 
Y

 
Z

ZANG
||
Zeta

Glossary of Terms
A

{
back to index
}

Action, (military):

In the military context, an
action
is a military engagement.
Seeing action
means being directly involved in an engagement (e.g. shooting and/or being shot at). (Compare
operation
.)

Admiralty, the:

The informal name for the
League
Office of the
Secretary of the Navy
. Always
the
Admiralty.

After Action Report, (AAR):

In the military, an AAR is a report produced to describe an
action
, its results and consequences. Generally speaking it is composed by the person in operational command. Delegating the writing of an AAR is considered bad form.

This another military term that has entered mainstream culture and many businesses and organizations now describe any form of retrospective analysis of some activity they undertook as an
after action report
.

AGI/AGE
:

Specialized vessels for conducting
IW
/
IO
and/or gathering intelligence. These vessels typically operate fleets of probes and drones, and are not intended to venture into forward combat areas during wartime. In peacetime, their operations are supposed to be limited to
interstellar space
, though disputes over the exact boundaries of interstellar space can lead to incidents.

By interstellar convention, naval AGI/AGEs are not stealthed and do not operate from deceptive cover. This preserves their character as naval noncombatants should they be taken prisoner. Of course, the various intelligence services operate unattributed AGI/AGEs that are stealthed and/or deceptive (as a rule), and their crews are considered spies if apprehended.

The exact interpretation of AGI or AGE varies with the service. The
Halith Navy
considers AGIs to be intelligence-gathering and IW vessels, and AGEs to be
EW
vessels, which typically deploy with fleets.

The
New UK’s
Royal Navy adopts the opposite convention, considering IW/IO auxiliaries (to include EW platforms) as AGIs, and AGEs to be intelligence gatherers (the
E
denoting
electronic
intelligence or, more broadly,
SIGINT
).

The
CEF
does not use the term
AGE
, but combines these functions under the rubric IO, and thus considers all such auxiliaries to be AGIs.

AI:

Artificial Intelligence. Something of a misnomer since it was proved that true intelligence cannot be created artificially, although it need not reside within a carbon-based life form. (This finding was immortalized in a seminal paper with the poetic subtitle:
Turing machines don’t dream
.) AI refers instead to various types of ‘expert systems’, some of which became quite sophisticated, but do not exhibit
intelligence
. Most AI technology
per se
was banned at the end of the
Formation Wars
, due to the disastrous consequences of reliance on it during that conflict. However, it still can be found some black-market applications, especially
VRSN
.

Note:
It is generally accepted among scholars that an over-reliance on AI technology had a corrosive effect on human decision making and this, exacerbated by the widespread use of neural implants and neural induction devices (
think-linking
), was a major cause of the Formation Wars; both of the conditions that set the stage for it, and the final spiral into it.

Aide-de-camp:

In general, a personal assistant or secretary (or chief of staff) to a high ranking person. In the military, a staff officer of a
flag officer
(navy) or a general (ground forces and marines) who acts in this capacity. In the ground forces or marines, this
billet
and the officer filling it, is called an
aide
or an
aide-de-camp
, with the latter title being insisted upon for grades above major general.

In the
CEF Navy
, only the
CNO
has an
aide-de-camp
, who is a captain and acts the CNO’s chief of staff. The Commandant of the CEF
Marine Corps
and Marshall of the
SRF
also have aides-de-camp (serving as chiefs of staff), who are typically a colonel in the marines and a captain in the SRF. (At the beginning of
LH-1
, the Chief of Staff to the Marine Commandant was a
brigadier
, but this was not subsequently repeated.) Compare
flag lieutenant
.

Halith
applies the term
aide-de-camp
to aides of any full admiral, who are always captains or commanders. (Halith does not practice staff rotation to the same degree as the CEF.) Other navies adopt similar practices.

Alecto Initiative, the:

A plot by
Nestor Mankho
to kill a large number of grand senators and heads of state at a series of
Grand Senate
hearings on
Nedaema
in mid-year ‘39. The plot was supported by both the
Bannermans
and
Halith
, who supplied Mankho with
FORPRO
to carry it out.

Amalekites
:

A rigidly puritanical heterodox neo-Christianist sect. Amalekites are violently opposed to all forms of ‘worldly temptation’ which they see as inherently evil. However, they reject any distinction between God and the Devil. Instead, they believe that God is wholly good, because he promises salvation (their vision of the good god is explicitly male, women representing ‘temptation’ and hence being evil), while simultaneously being wholly evil because he (or
she
in this case) created temptation. They think that they alone understand this true nature of God, and are thus the only people who will be saved. Accordingly, they venerate the ‘Holy Contradiction’ and the ‘Nine Torturing Angels’ who are unnamed. (They refer to them as
The Nine
, usually with finger signs, rather than aloud.) There are rumors that their obsession with the ‘Holy Contradiction’ leads to bizarre private practices.

Amalekite enclaves are found in many remote colonies, especially the
Outworlds
, and are generally unpopular. The largest known group is on
Harkness
, a primitive pastoral world where they have allegedly evolved a less strict version of their faith.

ANCAP:

Anti-Capture Protocol, an explosive device built into the combat helmets of
SOFOR
units to prevent capture of an intact brain.

Andaman & Nicobar:

The Sultanate of Andaman & Nicobar, often just the Sultanate. A militarily weak but strategically crucial
star civilization
located in the Antares region. Officially no longer a slave state, but known to still deal. Derives its importance from controlling the richest antimatter fuel fields known.

The Sultanate’s government is called
the Porte
; formally, the
Sublime Porte
.

Anson’s Deep, Battle of:

The largest space battle known to have been fought, and a signal
League
victory that was the tipping point of
LH-1
. Despite being vastly outnumbered, Vice Admiral
Ashlynn Kiamura
smashed a huge Halith combined fleet that was set to invade the key League sector of
Eltanin
. The victory effectively destroyed Halith’s capacity for offensive action and led them to sue for peace. The opportunity was nearly squandered at
Novaya Zemlya
ten months later.

Anson’s Deep, Nexus:

The most important
League
nexus
, located in
Eltanin Sector
. The
Battle of Anson’s Deep
, the critical battle of
LH-1
, was fought there. Protecting Anson’s Deep is the responsibility of the
CEF First Fleet
.

Antigua
:

An old and rich
League
Homeworld
located in the Fomalhaut zone, along with
Phaedra
. Antigua is a Latinate settlement, officially monolingual and the second richest single planet outside Sol; it is the only Homeworld without colonies. The economy is based primarily on finance, handcrafted luxury goods (including many sought-after wines and liquors), food exports, and sexual tourism. It maintains strong ties with
Terra
and often forms a voting bloc with it in the
Grand Senate
.

The original settlers were mainly from the vicinity of Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Ares, and have retained their culture. Noted for their wealth, their relaxed hedonistic lifestyle and
carnival
outlook, Antigua nonetheless supplies many personnel to the
CEF
, especially
marines
.

AP:

Armor-piercing; as applied to munitions.

APS:

Anti-personnel; as applied to munitions.

Archon:

The head of the
Nedaeman
government, chosen by the Nedaeman Senate.

Area Defense:

A defense network that extends over a large volume, covering a fleet or establishing a wide perimeter around an installation. Achieved using networked sensors and long-range weapons (usually missiles), mounted on a number of ships or other platforms.

ARGONET:

A network used by the
League
government to share intelligence products among its various organizations and services. It is actually a proper name (a play on
Argonaut
), and not an acronym, although some tried to render it as one by combining the terms
analysis
,
research
and
government
, without much success. It is maintained by
DIO
.

Asylum:

Asylum is a secondary but important transit node in
Cygnus
. It forms a stellar triad with
Miranda
and
Epona
. Combined, these systems control major routes between the
League
, the
Karelian Republic
, and the
Kepler Junction
.

Asylum was named by an
Amalekite
splinter group from
Rephidim
, who thought it could provide a sanctuary free from all worldly temptation. Unfortunately for them, the system proved uninhabitable, and the colony died out within twenty years.

AU
:

Astronomical Unit. The mean Earth-Sol distance. ~149.6 million kilometers.

B

{
back to index
}

Ballast, in:

An sailing term for an unladen ship (one carrying no cargo). Still in rare use.

Bannermans:

The Bannerman Confederacy. A remnant of one of the
Slave Federations
that formed in the late stages of the
Formation Wars
. Based in the Praesepe Cluster and frequently allied with
Halith
. A major participant in the slave trade.

Battalion
:

A military ground forces or
marine
unit that ordinarily consists of three to six
companies
(though in some cases as few as two, or as many as eight). An infantry battalion will have more companies. An armored cavalry battalion will have fewer. Special purpose battalions also exist, and their organization varies accordingly. A battalion is commanded by either a lieutenant colonel or a colonel.

Bearing:

The horizontal angle between an observer and an object, measured from a reference line; elevation being the vertical angle with respect to a reference plane. In current naval usage
bearing
refers to this pair of angles; what was once called azimuth and elevation, or AZ-EL. Civil mariners prefer AZ-EL (pronounced
Azel
).

Bells:

An ancient method of marking time during a
watch
. Each bell, in
Terran
usage, is 30 minutes, or 8 bells per watch. Thus 1030 is ‘5 bells of the forenoon watch’ and ‘eight bells of the forenoon watch’ is noon (although this would never be said,
noon
being the official term, as is
midnight
).

Belt, the:

The second permanently established successful settlement after
Mars
, the Belt is distributed throughout Sol’s asteroid system and major moons. Highly decentralized, it is the richest
Homeworld
after
Terra
, and controls enormous resources, both locally and through its colonies. Known for being extremely proud and radically independent. Belters are thought to have played a major role in Terra’s revival from
The Troubles
. Often at odds with the
Meridies
.

Billet:

A post or position of employment, together with its tasks and responsibilities, that is occupied by a member of the military (other agencies also use the term).

In the military particularly, confusion can arise because of billets that sound like ranks, such as
commodore
,
flag lieutenant
,
Captain of the Fleet
, and
brigadier
. (There are related billets for
NCOs
, some quite senior.) All these billets confer temporary authority, usually in excess of the holder’s
substantive rank
, which adds to the potential confusion. However, such authority only lasts while the person occupies the billet and is constrained by the nature of the billet, unlike the authority conferred by their substantive rank, which is permanent and general.

Confusingly, a billet can also refer to temporary quarters or an official order to provide temporary accommodations for a member of the armed forces.

Black Army:

A terrorist group formed by
Nestor Mankho
. Destroyed by
Nedaema
after
LH-1
.

BMC
:

Battle Management Computer. An
IT
system that collates, processes and displays tactical data. Largely replaced by
omnisynths
in the
CEF
.

BOQ:

Bachelor Officers’ Quarters. Despite the name, more often used as temporary lodging for visiting officers than as base housing for unmarried ones.

Bosun:

A senior
warrant officer
, responsible for ship maintenance and damage control, assisted by bosun’s mates. (On carriers, battleships and dreadnoughts, bosuns report to a commissioned officer who runs the department, while frigates have a senior bosun’s
mate
in this
billet
who is typically a master
chief petty officer
.)

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