KREYSTHAHL

PLANET KREYSTHAHL

In a far and distant space, on the edge of the known universe, exists a galaxy much like the Milky Way. In this galaxy, which I shall call the "Comet’s Head ", is a star system. This star system has three asteroid belts and eleven planets with the biggest and most habitable planet in the middle. This habitable planet, which I shall call Kreysthahl (pronounced as krees'-tal), has seven moons and a blue-colored sun called Azul (pronounced as ah'-zool).

Compared to Earth, Kreysthahl is at least four times the size of Earth. The passage of time in Kreysthahl is almost the same as with Earth's except, a day is forty hours long. A calculation of the planet’s orbit around the local sun shows that it takes longer for it to make a revolution approximately twice a long as that of Earth's. Therefore, the people decided to make a month eight weeks long. Lastly, even with making a month eight weeks long, a year is still fifteen months long, a little over two and a half years Earth time.

Kreysthahl is a planet with an almost equal amount of landmass and water. The land or soil has a lavender hue that becomes violet when wet. The water with vast stretches of rivers and lakes has such crystalline clear waters that you can see the bottom. The sea has an iridescent color that cannot decide which color it is. One can drink it when it is clear but risk poisoning when it is iridescent. The water when drank have a slightly sweet taste. The water by itself can quench thirst and even stave off hunger but only for four hours. The sky is pale green with pearly white clouds that turn to pale blue when it is going to rain.

For the most part, the lands of Kreysthahl are plains, rolling hills and mountain ranges. There are no active volcanoes as of yet. There are however, many geysers near mountaintops. Usually but not always, what can be found on mountain peaks are huge crystalline rocks or boulders instead of snow. Like earth, below the equator Kreysthahl have two seasons. The rainy season, this lasts for eight months, and the dry season, which lasts for seven months. However, above the equator, there are four seasons, spring, summer, autumn and winter. The spring, summer and autumn seasons lasts four months while winter only lasts for three months.

During sunset, the first moon to rise at approximately twenty-five hours and zero minutes give or take a few minutes, is the smallest moon called Prisma. It has a very peculiar color much like a prism that when it catches the sunlight produces all the colors of the rainbow. This is exactly how you will see the color of Prisma in space. However, the colors clearly seen from the planet Kreysthahl are red, orange, and yellow all swirling and interchanging like a mood ring. The second moon to rise after four hours is the largest moon called Kwarts (pronounced koo-warts). It has the color of an unclear almost opaque quartz crystal. The third moons to raise after one hour and thirty minutes the second and third smallest moons commonly called as "The Pair". The second smallest is called Amteest (pronounced am'-thist) which has the color of the palest violet. In addition, the third smallest is Emral that has the color of the deepest green. The fourth moon to rise after three hours is the third largest moon called Quamaree (pronounced koo-wa'-mah-ree) with the color of the palest blue. The fifth moon to rise after four hours is the second largest called Iris. Its actual color is a light pink hue. However, because it rises behind Emral, Iris reminds the people of Kreysthahl of an eye. Finally, yet importantly, the sixth moon to rise after thirty minutes is the average sized moon called Ze. It has a very dark violet color. A lunar eclipse happens once every six months and a solar eclipse happens every 5 years. (I'm just guessing at the eclipses.)

There is a wide variety of flora and fauna. Of the flora, the most significant are the giant trees called Blue Wood. These trees can live for hundreds of thousands of years. A Blue Wood is like Earth's giant Sequoia tree but a Blue wood is at least four or five times a sequoia's size. The Blue Woods have pale blue leaves, pink flowers and dark blue bark/trunk. The Blue Woods have some sort of magical property that prevents it from burning when struck by lightning. Another significant tree used for constructing furniture and other wooden appliances is called Bonnies. Bonnies are the same as Blue Woods except for their size and for not being able to produce flowers. Bonnies when cut, shaped, and left to dry, become as hard as the steel of Earth. Usually, for furniture or for art, Bonnies are used. There are a variety of ferns and shrubs some poisonous to touch. In addition, most of the land has carpet-like three-inch red colored grass. Of the fauna, the most significant creatures are the dragons. A dragon, Earth's mythical creature, may be one, two, or three colored. The second most magnificent creatures are the dragonlings, a smaller version of the dragons. Of the fauna, two thirds have wings that include the insect family. Of the last third, half are land bound animals and half are water bound animals.

LANDING ON PLANET KREYSTHAHL

Because of the ever-growing population of Earth a number of people from all lifestyles decided to leave Earth in search of a new planet to call home. Three fourths of the members of this expedition have doctorate degrees in a variety of fields that were necessary for the survival of humans in other planets. There were all in all five thousand of them in two ships. Most of them were in Cryogenic Stasis the whole way. However, the crewmembers are awakened from cryogenic stasis every three years in shifts. They spend a month making sure everything is still running A OK. It only takes six crewmembers to run/check the ship's space worthiness. There are three groups of six crewmembers aboard each ship. The ships can run by itself having an Al program that can decide pretty much everything. However, something happened that the Al program aboard the ships couldn't handle, while in Hyperspace, the ships accidentally came upon a wormhole and were caught in it immediately. By the time the crewmembers were awakened, the ships were already in unknown space and the wormhole was gone.

When the crewmembers were up, they found themselves in uncharted space. The Al program of the ships couldn't even recognize any of the stars in the surrounding area. This brought home the idea that they were completely cut-off from Earth. The crewmembers that were awake decided to wake up the other members of the crew. The newly awakened crewmembers were updated on the current situation of the ships. Communicating with each other in the two ships, they decided that the original 6 who were supposed to take the shift would stay awake for a year to make sure that they find a planet before they encounter another problem that the Al program might not be able to handle. It took six shifts before the crew discovered a viable planet. When the crewmembers that were awake first discovered Kreysthahl, they were shocked because the planet defied the laws of gravity. Impossible as it may seem, the planet was four times the size of earth and yet have gravity lower than earth's. In addition, the conception of time there would be very long (See About Kreysthahl for time conversion information.). Sending a probe to the planet, they found that there were three landmasses of different sizes. They saw that most of the creatures were aviators. They saw a few grazers and carnivores, and a number of marine creatures. The probe sent all these information back to the ship and much more. It seems there was some sort of bacteria permeating the air. The air itself was more pure than that of earths. Since there were animals, maybe the bacteria was harmless. However, the crewmembers decided to send two of their members down to the planet and see what happens. They then decided on how long they should stay down there. In the end, they decided that the people going down should stay there for two months planet time or a little over six months earth time.

After living down the planet for two months Kreysthahl time, the crew decided to go back up to the ships to let the others know that nothing bad have happened to them and that they feel absolutely better than they did before. At the ship, the medical doctors ran a full diagnostics on the crewmembers that went down to the planet. The medical doctors where amazed to find that the crew members where in very good physical condition and some even looked younger than when they went down. However, the doctors also found the bacteria in the air now resided in the crewmembers' blood stream. The doctors talked to themselves and decided that the crewmembers must have adapted to the planet gradually over the months without them knowing it. As it is, the crew members were beginning to show signs that something was wrong, all they could say though was that there was something wrong in the ship's air. That was when the doctors knew that going down the planet would mean staying there forever for better or for worse. Because of the increasing uneasiness of the members who went down, the other crewmembers decided to wake up the officers. Upon fully awakening from the cryogenic sleep, the officers were informed of the situation regarding the planet and the crewmembers that went down. After some very long discussions, the officers decided to take a chance and make the planet their home. Therefore, the chore of transporting the people from the ship to the planet commenced.

They chose to land on the smallest continent, the one without too much trees or mountains unlike the other two bigger landmasses, to use as the The Center point. It took some time for this to accomplish because houses needed construction before people go down to the planet. The first to go down were paleontologists, zoologists, botanists, medics, chemists, and geologists. Then construction workers were next to go down to the planet to construct housing and other buildings while the scientists were doing tests and surveys. When the central buildings were done and a few housing buildings, the civilians were the next to go down. The construction workers kept on constructing housing until all the civilian families were accommodated. The housing were identical with two bedrooms. A single civilian shared with another single civilian, a couple shared with another couple, and families with children had the house to themselves. The bathing facilities had to be central for now so there were two buildings made, for men and for women.

Over the days and months, the people were lucky enough to adapt to the planet. Gradually, others moved out from The Center, the place where they landed, and settled on other places. When two families decided to move near the beach, the children, a seven-year-old girl from one family and a nine-year-old boy from another family found the first dragonling nest. The children decided to look after the nest and see what hatches from the eggs. The children took to camping near the nest with provisions. After a few days, the eggs began to hatch. The first to emerge was an iridescent dragonling; the children couldn't help but feel the creature's hunger. Feeling bold, the girl decided to come out of here hiding and threw a morsel of food from her hand towards the dragonling. The dragonling smelling the food proceeded to eat it. When the dragonling ate the first morsel, the girl threw another morsel all the while thinking as if to let the dragonling know that the food was okay to eat and that she has more if it wants more. The dragonling sensing what the girl was thinking, it decided that it was okay to come near her and eat from her hand. When the dragonling flew to land on the girl's outstretched hand, the girl was a bit surprised and looked down to the dragonling at her hand at the same time that the dragonling looked to the girl. That was when the first Imprinting of dragonlings occurred. The boy seeing the success of the girl decided to mimic what the girl did. While watching the hatching, the children noticed that the dragonlings came in a variety of color. Some were one solid color while others sported two or three colors. In the end, both the boy and the girl were able to Imprint two dragonlings each an iridescent and a red-gold for the girl, and a silver-blue and blue-green-yellow for the boy. Their find were brought back to The Center for observations. When one of the dragonlings were about to be subjected in an x-ray machine, it got so frightened that it Went from the lab to the girl's shoulder in the blink of an eye. In the end, the dragonlings were deemed ok to have as a pet and there was a rush to nearby shores for other inhabitants to Imprint a dragonling. Soon, all civilians had at least one dragonling. In addition, if you had three or more dragonlings, it was called a flock.

FIRST SHOWER AND FIRST IMPRESSIONS

The people who colonized Kreysthahl had been living peacefully for fifteen years, there was now roughly eight thousand people living, before the first Shower occurred. The Shower occurs every four hundred years Kreysthahl time and lasts for sixty years. However, the colonists didn't know that when they landed. Moreover, because of the bacteria that were in the air, they are planet-bound. Before the first Fall of the Shower occurred however, the people noticed a great big comet pass by so near the planet that they could distinguish its color. They have therefore called this comet, Blue Streak. When the first day the Fall occurred, at least a third of the population died. The Fall is like a Ribbon, space debris from the comet's tail that falls like black ribbons, that when it falls to the ground or on anything, the surrounding area bursts to fire. When the people first tried to douse the fire with water, it only made the fire stronger as if water was a source of fuel. That was when the people knew of the hidden abilities of the dragonlings. Some of the dragonlings all Ported to a place a few hundred feet above the dwellings of the humans, froze the showering Ribbons and then burned them out of the sky until the Ribbons were no more but vapor, which must be where the sea got its iridescent sheen. While the other dragonlings proceeded to freeze the fire already started on the ground and then blasting the frozen fire till it was nothing but vapor.

The governing officers decided that the survivors of the first Shower were to return to The Center. The people received fire extinguishers and Fire Fighters worked overtime to try to stop the Ribbons from burning the rest of the place. Unfortunately, as this catastrophe was happening, a volcano near The Center gave signs that it will erupt some time in the near future. The governing officers dispatched some people to look for a new place to settle that didn't have an active volcano.

The people dispatched tried the largest continent to see if it was viable. While flying over the continent, the pilot noticed that the trees didn't burst into fire when a Ribbon landed. The Ribbon was still on the tree but the tree was not burning. That was when they thought of making tree houses. The giant trees called Blue Wood, named for its leaf color derived its name after the Red Wood giant trees of earth. A Blue Wood is at least two hundred and fifty feet tall. Their base is as wide as five acres. That means they could carve out the trees in levels to make a decent home to house a thousand people more or less. Therefore, they found a cluster containing twenty Blue Woods. The first Tree City of Kreysthahl called Kreysthahlia. Careful planning and research deemed it safe to carve out ten levels out of the tree and still make the tree safe to live in. The people dispatched carved out the levels from the Blue Woods so that at most a thousand people, one hundred per level, can safely live in it. It took a year to carve out the trees that would house the people of The Center. After finishing their grueling work, the people dispatched reported their work over the year to the governing officers back in The Center, and so the people of The Center began the journey of moving from The Center to the largest continent. However, before the people could move out of The Center, the volcano near The Center decided to blow and there was panic and confusion in getting off The Center. In the confusion, people didn't realize that most of their dragonlings were no longer with them and left behind.

After moving to the largest continent, which the people called Northland, of which over the years became Noran, it wasn't until a month passed before anybody noticed that there weren't many of the dragonlings anymore. The people thought that the dragonlings couldn't stay here in Northland. However, no really dwelled on it since the people were safe for now from the dreaded Shower but the countryside wasn't so they still needed to go out and put out the fires. Their supplies of fire extinguishers were steadily dwindling and they needed a steady supply of ice or water and someway of disposing Ribbon. It was then that people started thinking of their dragonlings but there were so few of them now. Just a couple hundred when there were thousands at The Center. So again, the governing officers sent out people to look for dragonling nests.

There was a couple, Corran and Serena, which went out looking for eggs. They were the children who first found the dragonling nest. They still had their dragonlings with them. Over the years, they were able to command their dragonlings to do things for them. This time, they asked their dragonlings to find a dragonling egg to help fight the Ribbon. However, the dragonlings took them near the mountains instead of near the shore. Corran and Serena thought that the dragonlings must be mistaken and were about to tell their dragonlings to come back when they heard a humming from somewhere inside the mountain. They were not the only ones that the dragonlings led into the mountain. Other people who still had dragonlings came to the same mountain that Corran and Serena's flock of dragonlings did. After careful looking, they found a cave and followed it inside that led into a huge cavern. They were astonished to find themselves in a cavern full of, well they look like dragonlings but they are so much bigger and they look like Earth's famous mythical creatures, the dragons. Unlike the dragonlings, dragons wait for or anticipate the hatching of the eggs. When all the people with dragonlings crowded into the cavern, one dragon guarding the clutch of hatching eggs eyed and tasted the scent of the people. Finding nothing wrong with the scent of these peculiar animals, the mother dragon deemed it okay for the animals to be present in the hatching. During the hatching, a silver-colored hatchling was crying its hunger and looking around for someone/something to take off its hunger. The mother dragon nudged the little hatching closer to the animals and the hatchling went straight for Corran. When the hatchling was in front of Corran's feet, Corran looked down and Impressing occurred. At the same time, Corran was shocked to hear a voice in his head, "I am Spirith. I am King and you will be my Rider. I am hungry." At first the mother dragon was surprised at the Impressing but then, the hatchling chooses its Impress just as she chose hers so very long ago. Looking at what was happening to Corran, Serena didn't notice that there was also an iridescent hatchling in front of her. The hatchling had to get Serena's attention by bumping her knee. Looking down another Impressing occurred, Serena amazed heard a voice in her head, "I am Firanth. I am Queen and you will be my Rider. And I am very hungry." In addition, other dragons Impressed with the other people who came into the cavern. In the end, a dozen people were able to Impress with the Hatchlings, four females including the Queen and eight males including the King. However, not all the hatchlings chose to Impress with other humans who have not yet Impressed.

HISTORY

During the first fifteen years, roughly more than thirty years earth time, of relative peace in Kreysthahl, the people started to physically change gradually. People's lives became longer and their eyes were turning into something like a cat's eye. Their hair color even began to change from something simple to something bizarre. This changes to their physical self were occurring because they were adapting to the bacteria in the air. In addition, they were healthier by far compared to when they were back on Earth. The Medics were somewhat stumped as to why such things would occur just because of the bacteria on the air. However, since, no one was suffering from it, they held their peace. In addition, newborns were being born already with slitted eyes, and they are starting to age according to Kreysthahl time instead of Earth time. Those few people who were already fifty when they reached Kreysthahl, were all still alive and well, and looked as if they would still be alive for a couple of decades or more.

During the first Shower, when Firanth and Spireth matured, they mated as much as possible to produce many clutches. Firanth never clutched less than twenty eggs. Even the Reds and female Greens helped with clutching two to ten eggs. However, once a Red or female Green started to breathe either fire or ice, they become infertile. Seeing that there were enough dragons to keep the people safe, the Reds and Greens were encouraged to breathe fire or ice as soon as possible to lower the numbers of the dragon population. They may still rise to mate but they will never produce a clutch. Back when Firanth and Spireth Impressed, not all of those hatchlings that hatched chose to Impress with a human. Some of them chose to be wild. And over the years, the number of wild dragons became less but never reached a point of extinction. There always seemed to be about fifty of them flying loose and wild. However, once in a while but never often, an adult wild dragon would choose a human to Impress.

The four hundred Cycle of peace from Ribbon is almost over and dragon riders will once again be needed to save Kreysthahl. The current Cycle is 455 AS or 470 years since landing.