Rules of Engagement Started 2000-01-17. === Characters Novanima from Gondor Tiger Mission commander, Marshal of Gondor. Lion. Simba Her mate. Training, military, general troubleshooting. Lion. Selen Psychology, training. Otter. Titania His mate. Medicine, public health; graphic arts. Otter. Valeria Manufacturing (inorganic), military. 'Uomi. Quin Her mate. Manufacturing (polymers), genetic engineering. 'Uomi. Xena Military, training. Major, chief of Gondor "army". Jaguar. Wolf Her mate. Agriculture, military. Jaguar. Forelle President of Gondor (and still there). Otter. Lions on Earth Charlie Formerly Chairman of the FRB, Ambassador to Rwanda, etc. Original lion. Diana His mate. Original lion. Leo Composer of ``clatter'' music. Original lion. Alice His mate. Graphic artist. Original lion. Claude Tiger and Simba's offspring, head of Eridanus Corporation. Demeter His mate. x,y Shadow's parents. Doctors, killed and eaten when New York fell. Adult Humans Secretary General of the United Nations. President of the United States. Leader of the hardshell Baptists, killed by Tiger. His wife. Second in command and his wife, mean to the orphaned children. William America ``Colonel America'', warlord. Orphans Cricket Black street urchin and pickpocket, befriended by Tiger, adopted by Valeria and Quin. Her legal name is Latanya Briggs. Jelani Her boyfriend. Not an orphan. 2 orphans Formerly children of the hardshell Baptist leader. Shadow Lion kitten, escaped the fall of New York, adopted by Tiger and Simba. Serial number: L29662-1623 Gerbil Albanian teenager adopted by Tiger and Simba. He's forfeited his Albanian name for cowardice in the battle that destroyed his village. Katica Young Bosnian girl adopted by Gerbil and Tiger. Angela Canadian teenager, love interest of Gerbil. x Three Chinese refugees rescued by Xena. === Characters in Chapters 1. From the Frying Pan to the Fire. Viewpoint: Tiger. With the whole crew, Claude and Leo. Work in Alice. 2. United We Stand. Viewpoint: Tiger. With the UN Secretary-General. 3. Ice Island Bavaria. Viewpoint: Simba? Titania? 4. Woodsey Hollow. Viewpoint: Cricket. With Valeria, Quin and Jelani. Later: Valeria and Cricket steal Armco. 5. World Cup Fever. Viewpoint: Shadow. 6. Hard-Shell Baptists. Viewpoint: See if Selen can do this one, since it's a psych issue. 7. Colonel America. Viewpoint: Xena. With Col. America, at least some. 8. Summer on the Dalmatian Coast. Viewpoint: Tiger, with various soldiers. 9. Call Me Rat. Viewpoint: Gerbil, with Tiger and Simba, and Valeria in factory sequence. 10. There Is Only One Illyria. Viewpoint: Tiger, with Gerbil and various others. 11. Chang Seeds Bought and Sold. Viewpoint: Selen? Xena rescues Chinese orphans. Wolf involved with crop sales and infrastructure. 12. Technical Support. Viewpoint for tech support: Shadow (or Chinese orphan?). For battles: Xena. 13. The Mao Dynasty. Viewpoint: ? 14. The Legacy of Alfred Nobel. Viewpoint: Tiger, with the whole crew. === Dates We don't give a date origin explicitly. All dates are expressed as Earth years since Tiger and Simba were assembled. (Since Tiger has spent 32.4 years frozen, for a round trip to epsilon Eridani, her biological age is correspondingly less.) It was discovered in ``Tiger in the River'' that Novanima age much slower than humans do. The abbreviation eyr means Earth years. tyr means Thor years. 1 tyr = 0.573 eyr. === Population growth models On Thor, rapid population growth is essential. Parents start reproducing at age 18 (Earth years) and produce eight kittens per pair, one per Earth year, approximately. The exponential increase time used in ``Tiger in the River'' is 15.87 eyr, starting from 16 people at date 67.3 or (pro forma) one at 23.3. With this model, when they launch at 142.0, there would be approximately 1770 people on Thor. On Earth it's assumed that on arrival the population is 5.13e10 people. That would translate to a growth rate of 1.1% per year or 88 years e-folding time. Present population growth is faster than that. 3% to 4% is easily achievable. In the American West of the 19th century, a typical family size was 10 children of whom half died, or 2.5:1 breeding ratio and around 25 year average generation time. That would give a rate of 3.6% per year. === Xena's Pro Forma Military Rank If the breeding ratio is 4:1 then 1/3 of the population will be adults (including post-reproductive people) and 2/3 will be children (or people before the customary time of reproduction). If there are 1770 people on Thor, 590 will be in the non-child category. These form the ``army'' of Gondor. United States military organization, triangular system (World War II). Organizational style changes according to current tactical needs, and a x5 organization (skipping the brigade) was popular during the Cold War. For the larger units the sizes are approximate, and support people have to be included. Squad 16 people Sergeant E3 Platoon x3 50 2nd Lieutenant Company x3 150 Captain Battalion x3+1 500 (plus weapons platoon) Major Regiment x3 1500 Colonel Brigade x3 5000 Brigadier Division x3 15000 Major General With this organization, Xena would qualify as a battalion commander, with a rank of Major. === Chang Bushes In ``Tiger in the River'' these parameters are used: Food requirement (dry Chang seeds) per adult 1/2 Kg/day Equivalent calories 1700 (underestimate?) Chang bush production (mature bushes) 2e-3/day Size of mature bushes 10 Kg Floor area per bush 11 m^2 = (3.3 m)^2 However, these were said to be special dwarf bushes. I think the relation between biomass and floor area is not right. In ``Love at First Sight'' the Terran bushes are said have these dimensions: Height 2 m Radius 0.7 m Margin between bushes 0.3 m Grid spacing, center to center 1.7 m Floor area, bush only 1.54 m^2 Floor area including margins 2.89 m^2 Production (CIMMYT rice, 1970) 0.6 Kg/yr m^2 = 0.00164 Kg/day m^2 Production (high yield wheat, 1998) 1.2 to 1.5 Kg/yr m^2 = (2.4 Kg/yr m^2 occasionally) 0.00329 to 0.00411 Kg/day m^2 Tiger in the River uses the CIMMYT figure, blaming the lower yield on inefficiencies in quinone isomerization. (The bushes soak up sunlight during the day, isomerizing quinones, then at night they open their stomata and collect carbon dioxide, using the quinone energy.) We also will use it. Thus: Floor area (including margins?) per adult 304 m^2 Number of bushes (counting margins) 105 Total biomass per adult 250 Kg Mass per bush 2.38 Kg This mass per bush is probably an underestimate, and the seed production per bush mass is overestimated. === Farm Economics A standard family plot has enough area to feed four people. We'll use 100 bushes (rather than 105) per person, or 400 bushes, or 1200 m^2. The bushes are arranged in a 20x20 array. Each person gets 5 rows of 20 bushes. If the bushes are harvested every 3 or 4 days, you would get 6 to 8 kilos. We'll use 8 kilos. Price of rice (50 lb, in 2000, USA) $22 = $0.97/Kg = 0.0645 fang/Kg Gerbil's half is worth $3.88 = 0.258 fang Tiger's mass 75 Kg Simba's mass 72 Kg Shadow's mass (10 lion year) (eats like adult) 35 Kg (x2 metabolism) Gerbil's mass (16-17 year) 65 Kg (x1.5 metabolism) Gerbil would eat 0.75 Kg/day === Albania Web site: http://mininf.gov.al (Ministry of Information). The local language is called "Shqip" in the local language, and "Shqiperia" is the local name for Albania. It would appear that the Latin-1 alphabet is used. Some Albanian names: Ilir Meta Prime Minister Makbule Çeço Deputy Prime Minister & Minister of Labor Lufter Xhuveli Minister of Agriculture Edi Rama Minister of Culture, Youth & Sports Luan Hajdaraga Minister of Defense Ermelinda Meksi Minister of Economic Cooperation & Trade Et'hem Ruka Minister of Education and Science Anastas Angjeli Minister of Finance Paskal Milo Minister of Foreign Affairs Leonard Solis Minister of Health Ilir Zela Minister of State close to Prime Minister Ilir Panda Minister of Justice Arben Demeti Minister of Public Works Bashkim Fino Minister of Local Government Spartak Poçi Minister of Public Order Mustafa Muçi Minister of Public Economy & Privatization Ingrid Shuli Minister of Transport Selected names: Gerbil's father Enver His mother Ingrid Village headman Bashkim Neighbor lady Mrs. Ruka Doctor Dr. Demeti Gerbil's village is Nikç, in northern Shkodër province. The ceramics factory, which Valeria works on, is located in Koplik, east of Lake Scutari close to the border with Montenegro. It is a smaller town on the rail line running South sort of along the coast to the port (?) city of Durrës. On Albanian maps Lake Scutari is referred to as Ligen i Shkodrës. The containing province is called Shkodër, as is the capital city of the province, southeast of the lake. Named personnel: Factory manager Mr. Spartak Solis (shamelessly scrambling names) Assistant manager Arben Worker Paskal (killed) Worker Luan (psychologically injured) Worker Makbule (becomes assistant manager #1) Worker Lufter (killed) Worker Mustafa (killed) Worker Ilir (junior guy) Worker Anastas (becomes assistant manager #2) The textile factory that Quin advises is in Gostivar, a smallish town in western Macedonia, also on a rail line. === Albanian Pronunciation http://albanian.com/main/culture/language/alphabet.html These are the ones not matching English. Albanian glyph = English digraph = sample English word. c = ts = curtsy ç = ch = church q = ch = chair e = e = set ë = schwa = term i = i = machine g = g = go gj = dg = dodge j = y = year x = dz = adze xh = dj = jester y = ü = Führer dh = th (voiced) = they zh = zh = vision rr = trilled = burro (Spanish) === Croatian Names The little girl is named Katica after Ivani¹eviæ, Katica, the president of the House of Representatives in Croatia. There are much fewer women in the Croatian government than in Albania (which doesn't have that many). The above name is in the Windows-1250 charset, which I assume to be Latin-2 or something like that. With a proper font, it comes out as Ivanis\vevic\', Katica (where s\v = s with a hacek or inverted ^ over it, probably pronounced sh, and c\' is an acute accent, which most likely is pronounced ch. So there's no further clue of how to pronounce the personal name. From: http://goeasteurope.about.com/travel/goeasteurope/blcrpro.htm `c' is usually pronounced ts, sometimes ch. A (U.S.?) Army publication says `c' comes out as `s' or `ch'. In their sample names, every `c' was pronounced `ch'; however, all were initial or final (and almost all were masculine). 80% of family names end in vic\' (\' not written on their list) as is typical among Slavs. Among place names, final `c' was invariably `ts' and internal or initial `c' was always `ch'. Always (?) the first syllable is stressed. C\'etnik = derogatory word used by Bosnians (and Croats?) to describe Serbs. Hercegovina (c=ts) = name of Bosnia's partner in destruction. Shiptar = derogatory word used (by Bosnians?) for Albanians. This is obviously a corrupted version of the Shqip word for Albanians: Shqipëtar. Ustasha = derogatory word used (by Bosnians?) to describe Croats or the Croatian SS during World War II. "Serbo-Croatian" language is a political construct in which the King of Serbia was trying to promote unity in his domains. Presently Serbia uses a variant of Cyrillic whereas Croatia uses Latin-2 (I think). Montenegro also speaks Serbo-Croatian and the Serbian faction uses Cyrillic whereas the independent faction uses Latin-2. Bosnians apparently also use Serbo-Croatian (Latin-2). Pronouns and cases are identical, but there are pervasive vocabulary differences; some of the more comical ones, contrasting Croatian with Serbian, were listed in http://www.hrvatska.org/mcadams/sacramento_bee2_letter.htm Enough research. We're going with `ch', i.e. KATic\'a. There is a Cyrillic charset used in Macedonia, apparently, not Greek. Somewhere I picked up that c = k (Makedonia). === Places in Montenegro The capital is Podgorica (which appears also to be the name of the nation as said by Serbs). It's due south of the big mountain. There is a town Niks\^ic\' which is probably a provincial capital, northwest of the mountain. Lake Shkoder is in the southernmost corner and you would travel southeast to reach it from anyplace reasonable for the 1st division camp. === Chinese Names and Words Shadow Ying3 dze5 Nurse hu4 she4 Good morning dzao3 an1 ("morning peace", often abbreviated to just dzao3) === Where the bodies were buried Montenegro Krzhanja Croatia Brinje (diverted to Nikç, Gerbil's Albanian village) Serbia Divci Macedonia Arbinovo Albania Krrabë === Montenegro The First Division is camped near Krusi in Montenegro, in the mountains toward the coast. Srpska Zemlya Priagora (Serbian Land of Montenegro) (Cyrillic). This web site asserts Serbian authority over Montenegro and describes an ethnically cleansed Montenegro as the desired eventual state. Another web site (http://www.mnnews.net) using Latin-1 (not Latin-2) presents news from the point of view of the (struggling to be) independent administration of Montenegro. Both sites seem to use Serbo-Croatian. === Timeline for ``Rules of Engagement'' Dates for events on epsilon Eridani are Tiger's `B' age (in the timeline from ``Tiger in the River'') plus 27.0 eyr, which arises as 16.2 eyr one-way journey as Tiger travels frozen from Terra to e Eri, plus 10.8 eyr lightspeed delay from e Eri to Terra. Months: .0 Mar .5 Sep .1 Apr .6 Oct .2 May .7 Nov .3 Jun .8 Jan .4 Aug .9 Feb Date Event 0.0 Tiger and Simba were assembled (Simba is 1 month younger). 26.5 Simba accepts job as Lion Disc editor. ``Simba Leones'' ends. 44.6 CQMT discovered, ``Tiger in the River'' begins. 50.4 Launch epsilon Eridani mission. Earth population: 1.5e10. 77.4* Arrival in the epsilon Eridani system. 79.2* Formal founding of Gondor: begin building colony. 83.2* 'Uomi implanted. For Valeria's B age subtract 88.6 from Terran date. 133.0* Oxygen atmosphere complete on Thor; start filling oceans. 138.7* Tiger adopts Fire Kittens; end of ``Tiger in the River''. 156.8* Fire Kittens on their own; launch Earth return mission. 162.2 Arrival at Earth. ``Rules of Engagement'' begins. 163.9 Scheldt locks sabotaged. 164.1 Rhine locks destroyed by Ice Island Bavaria. 164.3 Cricket makes it to refugee camp. 164.45 Fall of New York. Total collapse begins. 165.0 Shadow rescued from upstate New York. 166.0 Illyrian campaign starts