Wil McCarthy - To Crush the Moon

Print plate—(n) The largest single component of a fax machine, responsible for assembling and disassembling finished goods at the atomic level. Print plates are generally flat and most typically rectangular, although with effort they can be fashioned as cylinders or other three-dimensional forms.

Pseudoatom—(n) The organization of electrons into Schrödinger orbitals and pseudoorbitals, made possible with great precision in a designer quantum dot. The properties of pseudoatoms do not necessarily mimic those of natural atoms.

Pup—(prop n) Innermost world of the Wolf 359 star system, first colonized in Q427. Considered marginally habitable.

Quantum dot—(n) A device for constraining the position of one or more charge carriers (e.g., electrons) in all three spatial dimensions, such that quantum (“wavelike”) effects dominate over classical (“particlelike”) effects. Charge carriers trapped in a quantum dot will arrange themselves into standing waveforms analogous to the electron orbitals of an atom. Thus, the waveforms inside a quantum dot may be referred to collectively as a pseudoatom.

Reportant—(n) Any person or mechanism gathering information for public distribution.

Rodenbeck, Wenders—(prop n) Poet laureate of the Queendom era.

Senatoria Plurum—(prop n) The main governing body of the Luner nation of Nubia.

Sensorium, Neural—(n) Any system for channeling synthetic neural inputs into the brain. Sometimes employed as a form of torture, but generally considered a medium for education and entertainment, especially in remote environments.

Shattering, The—(prop n) Global seismic event with a death toll in the hundreds of millions, generally credited with destroying the post-Queendom Iridium Age civilization of Lune. According to Conrad Mursk, an ostensibly preventable disaster.

Sila’a—(n) A pinpoint fusion generator or “pocket star” consisting of a wellstone-sheathed neutronium core surrounded by gaseous deuterium. From the Tongan si’i (small) and la’aa (sun).

Sketchplate—(n) A thin, typically rectangular block or sheet of wellstone sized and preprogrammed for the portable display and input of text, drawings, and physical simulations.

Squozen Moon, The(See Lune )

Stealth—(n) Concealment, especially during movement or action. Colloquially, a synonym for technologically derived invisibility.

Stormlands, The—(prop n) 180-kilometer-wide region of Lune’s northern hemisphere, characterized by reduced gravity, peripheral convection cells, and permanent cyclonic weather formations.

Superabsorber (also superblack)—(n) Any material capable of absorbing 100% of incident light in a given wavelength band. The only known universal superabsorber (i.e., functioning at all wavelengths) is the event horizon of a hypermass. (Approximations of 100% absorption are generally referred to as “black.”)

Superfluid—(n, adj) Any fluidized material capable of propagating with zero friction and zero viscosity. The vast majority of superfluids are either cryogenic, as with liquid helium, or supercondensed, as with neutronium.

Superreflector—(n) Any material capable of reflecting 100% of incident light in a given wavelength band. No universal superreflectors are known. (Approximations of 100% reflectance are generally referred to as “mirrors.”)

Supervacuum—(n) A state of vacuum in which some wavelengths of the Zero Point Field have been suppressed or excluded. Since the speed of light is a function of vacuum energy, supervacuum is useful for the transmission of matter and information at supraluminal velocities.

Supraluminal—(adj) Exceeding the classical speed of light.

Tazzer—(n) A short-range beam weapon consisting of pulsed, coaxial streams of electrons and metal ions in a guide beam of blue or violet laser light. Tazzers are primarily used to induce temporary incapacity (pain, paralysis, unconsciousness), although lethal versions also exist.

Terraform—(v) To make Earthlike. In general, to match the gravity, climate, and atmosphere of a planet or planette to that of Earth, possibly including the imposition of a stable biosphere. Enclosed spaces are “climate controlled” rather than terraformed. Attributed to Jack Williamson.

Thermocline—(n) Any layer boundary marked by an abrupt change in temperature.

Tillspar—(prop n) Highest nonvacuum suspension bridge in the known universe, spanning the 10-kilometer-deep Highrock Divide in the Imbrian province of Apenine, Lune.

Timoch—(prop n) Capital city of the Luner nation of Imbria, with a population of approximately two million.

Tonga—(n) Former Earth kingdom consisting of the Tongatapu, Ha’apai, and Vava’u archipelagoes of Polynesia, and scattered islands occasionally including parts of Samoa and Fiji. Tonga was the only Polynesian nation never to be conquered or colonized by a foreign power, and was the last human monarchy prior to the Q1 establishment of the Queendom of Sol.

Tropopause—(n) In a planetary atmosphere, a sharply defined thermocline or barocline separating the troposphere or lower atmosphere from the stratosphere or upper atmosphere.

Upsystem—(adj, adv) One of the six cardinal directions: away from the sun in any orientation.

Varna—(prop n) A 640-meter-radius planette constructed in orbit around Luna by private investors during the latter years of the Queendom of Sol. Site of the Q1290 Treaty of Varna, granting Right of Return to Barnard refugees.

Viense—(prop n) Temperate Luner nation of the original Farside, including the north pole, with a population of approximately fifty million.

Wellcloth—(n) A fabric woven wholly or partially from wellstone fibers. While sheet wellstone could technically be considered a form of cloth, the term “wellcloth” is generally reserved for fabrics with weavelengths larger than 1 micrometer.

Wellglass—(n) Any wellstone substance which is both optically transparent and electrically insulative, often employed as the default state of wellstone devices. Most typically refers to a wellstone substance closely emulating the properties of transparent silica-soda-lime (SiO 2, NaO, CaO) “window glass” preparations except in terms of mass and toughness. In general, natural substances containing a preponderance of silicon are the easiest to emulate in a wellstone matrix.

Wellstone—(n) A substance consisting of fine, semiconductive fibers studded with quantum dots, capable of emulating a broad range of natural, artificial, and hypothetical materials. Typical wellstone is composed primarily of pure silicon, silicon dioxide, and gold.

Wellwood—(n) An emulation of lignous cellulose (“wood”), often employed as the default state of wellstone devices.

Zetta-ton—(n) A measure of mass, equal to 10 21tons or one million billion billion kilograms.

For the curious, the Lalandean world of Gammon and the Wolf 359 world of Pup, which are mentioned briefly in Chapter 10 and form the twin seats of the Biarchy government in Chapter 25, are described in more detail by this series’ previous volume, Lost in Transmission .