Places
Worlds, settlements, camps, and sites of discovery.
Showing introductory records. Switch to Full archive above to include later names and revelations.
Aconcagua weapons facility
The Aconcagua weapons facility was a covert Flaxen military research and manufacturing installation inside the Andes. Its protected location forced Echo's people to use a ground assault.
Africa
Africa becomes a principal theater of the Flaxen conquest after the invaders cross the Atlantic from the Americas. Their armies move north toward Europe.
Alaska
Alaska is the North American territory from which Flaxen forces cross the Bering Strait toward eastern Russia.
Andes Mountains
The Andes Mountains concealed a Flaxen weapons facility beneath Mount Aconcagua. The depth of the installation protected it against conventional air raids and the orbital weapons available to Echo before its refit.
Asia
Asia is the eastern theater of the war between United Earth and the Flaxens. Flaxen forces enter through the Bering Strait and advance westward.
Asteroid belt
The asteroid belt is a major source of mineral resources and the material used to build Cylli. Disputes over resources help drive the war between Earth and Mars.
Asteroid military base
A concealed military installation inside an asteroid became Brookes' nest and the refuge of Cylli and Echo. Its doors bore the flags of United Earth and the Martian Confederacy.
Atlantic Ocean
The Atlantic Ocean is the route by which Flaxen forces move from the conquered Americas into Africa.
Australia
Australia declares itself neutral in the war between United Earth and the Flaxens. It refuses to participate in the conflict.
Bering Strait
The Bering Strait separates Alaska from eastern Russia. Flaxen forces cross it to open an Asian front against United Earth.
British Isles
The British Isles were the heart of United Earth's territory. A large Flaxen air raid crossed toward them from Africa and bombed York.
Brookes's Venus facility
The Flaxens provided Avalon Brookes with a facility on Venus in which to modify the hawks. It also served as his place of recovery after punishments imposed by the Flaxus.
Camp Skadi
Camp Skadi is a Flaxen prison and forced-labor camp commanded by Colonel Jaakobah Flint. Its inmates endure hunger, disease, overcrowding, violence, and the threat associated with the red circles.
Canada
Canada is the territory where United Earth authorizes the first Flaxen settlement on Earth. Its sparse population helps make it the selected refuge for an initial thousand arrivals.
Canadian prison complex
The Canadian prison complex held convicted Flaxen leaders and Avalon Brookes after the war. Its prisoners were isolated from visitors and sentenced to remain for life.
Centaurus
Centaurus is a constellation used to identify the viewpoint of Serilda's encounter with the horde. Echo recognized her drawn star pattern as Centaurus viewed from Vega.
Copious
Copious is the planned destination of the first attempted human expedition beyond the solar system. It lies just under thirty-five light-years from Earth, orbiting an orange K-dwarf star.
Cylli
Cylli is a vast cylindrical space habitat near Jupiter, maintained by a conscious artificial intelligence. Its scale and sophistication draw the attention of Echo’s returning crew.
Cylli shipyards
Cylli's shipyards were fully automated facilities in the far section of the cylinder. Brookes sealed them with a quantum key after obtaining advanced transport craft.
Cylli's hilltop learning building
A Roman-style marble building stood on Cylli's highest hill. It had been a place of learning and collaboration before the Titan and became Brookes' chosen palace during his brief rule.
Earth
Earth is humanity’s homeworld and the birthplace of United Earth. Almost ten thousand years after Echo’s departure, it is divided by the war against Flaxen conquest.
Eastern Asia
Eastern Asia was a front where the Flaxens were advancing rapidly. Minister Eppleston proposed an orbital attack on a base there, but Eastcott chose to target death chambers in the Americas instead.
Eastern Russia
Eastern Russia is the Asian territory reached by Flaxen forces crossing the Bering Strait from Alaska.
English Channel
The English Channel lay along the route followed by the Flaxen aircraft attacking York. The raiders approached it after fighting United Earth aircraft over Europe.
Europe
Europe is contemporary United Earth's political heartland and a principal target of Flaxen air attacks. United Earth retains all of Europe when Echo surveys the war.
Flaxus (city)
Flaxus was the capital city of Venus. Eastcott's upgraded scorpion attacked a rare mineral processing facility there, less than a mile from the Flaxus's location.
France
France lay beneath the path of the Flaxen raid on York. Echo's bridge crew saw at least fifty Flaxen bombers brought down over France before the raiders approached the English Channel.
Ganymede
Ganymede is Jupiter's largest moon. Brookes used it as a staging point for his indirect attack on Cylli.
Great Britain
Great Britain houses the contemporary United Earth War Ministry. Cyrus Eppleston receives Echo's first transmissions there.
Greenland
Greenland was within the area crossed by the expanding atmospheric disturbance from the scorpion's sudden arrival over Iceland.
Hawk's Retreat
The Hawk's Retreat was the unofficial name of the Capitol building in Venus's northern hemisphere, where the Flaxus conducted state business. Its name reflected Flaxen admiration for birds of prey.
Helen's cabin
Helen's cabin stood near one of Cylli's rivers. The nearby bench, waterfall, and wildlife became part of her shared life with Cylli.
Hut seven
Hut seven is a prisoner dwelling within Camp Skadi. Serilda Corazon, Megan, and numerous sick or injured inmates live within its thin metal walls.
Iceland
Iceland housed United Earth Intelligence's complex on its northern coast. Its defense became critical while Serilda and the half-Flaxen team worked against Flaxen commanders.
India
India lies near the eastern front described in Echo's assessment of the Flaxen war. At the time of the ship's return, the line of conflict is slightly east of it.
Ireland
Ireland's west coast was reached by the ring of vapor produced when the scorpion appeared over Iceland after its dangerous micro-jump.
Jupiter
Jupiter is a giant planet in the Solar System. The immense cylindrical habitat Cylli lies nearby.
Jupiter station
Jupiter station is a strategically contested orbital installation fought over by United Earth and Mars during the six-year war. It changes hands three times in the first four years.
Justice Building
The Justice Building is a marble judicial building in Wellington on Venus. Before the occupation its proceedings ratified predetermined sentences; afterward it housed United Earth's war-crimes trials.
Keiper Belt
The Keiper Belt is the outer solar-system region that Formidable and Echo must clear before engaging their sphere drives. Echo crosses it again on the return toward Earth.
Lunar helium-3 processing plant
The lunar helium-3 processing plant is attacked by a Martian destroyer at the beginning of the war with United Earth. The recently activated Echo destroys the attacking vessel.
Mars
Mars is the home of the Martian Confederacy. Its secession from United Earth leads to a six-year war before the Copious expedition.
Mediterranean
The Mediterranean lay beneath the Flaxen aerial force launched from Africa toward the British Isles. Echo tracked the raiders there before the opposing air forces engaged.
Mexico
Mexico lies within the southern extent of the Flaxen gains during their first war with United Earth.
Milky Way
The Milky Way filled the night sky visible from Mars. Earth's light pollution had left few places where its beauty could be observed as clearly.
Mount Aconcagua
Mount Aconcagua concealed the Flaxens' secret infrasound weapons facility. Hastings's Marines destroyed the installation with five advanced explosives, causing the peak to collapse and cease to be the highest in the Andes.
North America
North America is the initial center of Flaxen settlement and conquest on Earth. The first war leaves the Flaxens in control of nearly the whole continent, extending into much of Mexico.
North Pole
Earth's North Pole lay beneath the escaping lunar projectile after its glancing impact with the hawk. The rock continued harmlessly into space.
Outer military bases
Hundreds of military installations were built by the earlier Earth–Mars alliance in preparation for the horde. Cylli knew of bases circling the solar system approximately a light-year from Earth.
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean lay within Echo's direct line of sight when York was attacked. Earth's rotation prevented Echo from directly targeting the aircraft over Europe with its deflection lasers.
Rare mineral processing facility
The rare mineral processing facility was an industrial target in Venus's capital, Flaxus. Its output supported tanks, aircraft, and communications equipment.
Russia
Russia contained the remaining significant Earth deposits of the minerals needed by the Flaxen war industry. The mines lay deep inside United Earth territory.
Sahara Desert
The Sahara Desert marked the northern reference point for the African Flaxen base attacked by Lucinda. The target lay farther south on dry plains, away from the front line.
Saturn
Saturn is the planet orbited by Titan. Researchers studying its largest moon recover the organism that later devastates human civilization.
Scotland
Northern Scotland housed United Earth's First Air Fleet. Its location was near the limit of Flaxen striking range while allowing aircraft to defend much of Europe.
South America
South America contained a covert Flaxen military research station deep in the Andes. Serilda's intelligence identified it as a center for manufacturing the new infrasound weapons.
Texas
Texas was a region of Flaxen-controlled Earth where approximately one hundred thousand captive Humans were enclosed in a wire-fenced square. Flaxen bombers killed them during Kilter Shrader's broadcast to United Earth.
The Americas
The Americas are the continental territories controlled by the Flaxens by the time Echo returns to Earth.
The Moon
The Moon is Earth's natural satellite. Echo uses its far side to conceal the ship's location while preparing contact with contemporary United Earth.
The Sun
The Sun is the star of Earth, Mars, and Venus, and an energy and material source for later planetary engineering. Echo returns toward it after the failed journey to Copious.
Titan
Titan is Saturn's largest moon and the source of the organism responsible for the Titan pandemic. Its lakes contain liquid methane and ethane.
Vega
Vega is a star twenty-six light-years from Earth. Serilda's sketch and Echo's comparison of its light made it a possible location of the horde.
Venus
Venus is the terraformed homeworld of the Flaxens. Earth and Mars transform it from an extreme environment into a habitable planet before the Titan.
Wellington
Wellington is the postwar name of Venus' Capitol city. United Earth held major war-crimes trials there after the occupation.
York
York was a regional capital of United Earth and the most heavily populated city in Europe. Flaxen bombers deliberately attacked its population centers after Serilda's extraction.