Politics

When the Gaians were ejected from their ancestral home of Earth, their new concerns and burgeoning magical capabilities rapidly rendered much of the politics of their old world obsolete. Scarcity of resources or classical currency meant little with an unimaginably vast horizon of new worlds on the proverbial doorstep, and concepts of ownership of abstract land were soon widely acknowledged to be completely farcical for a species that could barely even return to its supposed “home.”

Out on the Portal Network, conflicts of conviction occur when managing the growth and flow of settlers, negotiating supply lines and safe passage through hazardous regions, or deciding how to engage with the plethora of natural habitats, wildlife, and abandoned structures that serve as both new homes and lawless frontiers. Gaians have divided opinions on the ideal ways of establishing order and prosperity among the stars, and bold charismatic souls have faced dire struggles in attempting to convince proponents of opposing views to work together for the good of all.

Leadership
Some have argued that human beings in groups are easily led, and that many do not, in fact, even want to take any responsibility or make decisions for themselves. Others have argued in turn that regardless of disinclination toward responsibility, all must be offered the same opportunity to have their voice heard and recognized, and their concerns represented in matters of the community. The degree to which residents have meaningful power over their neighborhood’s evolution varies sometimes wildly from settlement to settlement, but the responses to this question can be broken down into four broad schools of thought.

Collectivists
For all the disagreements and seething hatreds birthed between nations and peoples on Earth, it is hard to argue that the capacity for social cooperation is one of our species’ greatest strengths. The Collectivist believes that our survival and strength to thrive is inescapably built upon our abilities and willingness to support one another, and that this ethos should inform the choices, and the compromises, that we make. Societies of collectivists will hear all viewpoints constructive to the whole, and seek to empower their group as a unit, rather than in competition with each other. This philosophy is built not only on an egalitarian approach to entertaining concerns, but also on a respect that includes a healthy acknowledgement of expertise. If a member of a collectivist society is clearly more qualified in the relevant field, their opinions on matters pertaining to that field are afforded appropriate weight.

Freedom of political thought is a Gaian treasure, so it is worth noting that wide Gaian organisations, such as the Faculty, do not insist upon a particular worldview. That said, a significant majority of Faculty members are Collectivists.

Facultists
Across dozens of cities in all four sectors, milling through the crowds, it is clear to see that many view the Faculty as heroes. They know the answers to the problems, or, when they don’t know, they find them. They restore failing atmospheres, they create the arcana generators that light and heat homes effortlessly, they cross space and dimensions to lands unknown and spread those stories so that all may know. This acknowledgement of real skill can lead to a veneration that might, in some hands, be enough to defy reason.

Those who see Faculty accomplishment as an inherent sign of superior authority are the sort of people less inclined to hear opinions to the contrary. Plenty of folks throughout Winter Street are Facultists, and some might say a distressing number of them are even members of the staff.

Nobilitists
A ghastly tradition carried from the years our kind spent on Earth is the view that the providence of one’s birth can make them inherently superior, or inherently inferior. That the son of a man who ruled thousands of men should, in turn, rule thousands, tens of thousands, of men by the fortune of his birth was declared by many to be the direct will of an ultimate being governing all things. Conversely, these thought patterns were turned on some less fortunate, and souls took to the sword in the name of bloodletting the land of those falsely claimed unworthy to walk it.

The flaws and assumptions in this kind of premise are self-evident, and the most lurid powers of Kings and Queens are thankfully buried under the mossy jungles of Earth. Fragments of these implications survive today, often in the families of those who Lost Something on Earth such as the displaced aristocracy on Mars, but not exclusively. There is some objective truth to the notion that a person takes after their ancestors, even if the potential and worth of their life is multidimensional and limitless, so iterations of this kind of belief system have sprung up in societies claiming no noble blood and decades removed from Earth – a charismatic sorcerer, or the diligent leader of a township, might have promising children, and the respect they earned may be passed on by their kinfolk.

Some find it distasteful, but the continued existence of Nobilitist societies proves they function enough for some. Some might say this is natural.

Anarchists
If the advent of the Portal Morning should have taught Gaians anything, it is that existence is unpredictable, and unknowably vast and wild. And with the way the decades have passed in the interim, there are many who have been given little reason to trust in the authority of others, for one reason or for a score. Anarchists may form collectives and may even entertain Collectivists, but their disdain for authority is palpable whether they operate on the edges of a hub city, or out on the Network somewhere, living alone or forever moving from place to place.

Conservation
Groups of humans moving as though they were entitled to the Earth is often listed as a catalyst for the industrial devastation wrought by the massive overgrowth of plants and trees at the dawn of the Portal Morning. It looked so much like revenge. Whether the true cause was only the collapse of the Exodus Meteor’s anti-magic field is less than relevant in many eyes – it is inescapable fact that the actions of mankind tore up wilderness to flex their dominance over nature. Many today do not wish to repeat those mistakes on new worlds, worlds that may be even less forgiving.

Similarly, some would say that there is still too much about the relics of the Ancestral Gardeners that we do not understand. Something happened that has made it so there are no more of them, so it follows that toying with their remains and their domains may lead to something happening that makes it so there are no more of us. These beliefs inform the views on how to respond to the alien ecosystems and abandoned ruins that Gaians encounter when travelling and exploring the Portal Network.

Reclamationists
A popular position, supported by all five of the hub cities for the most part, is that the cities and fruits of the Gardeners are our birthright, and the breadcrumbs left to support our own journeys across Vintergatan. The fact that something happened to our ancestors does not diminish the amazing leaps and strides we have taken as a result of investigating their architecture and their Network, and with a measured hand it’s reasonable to believe that no small wonder of other miracles may lie on worlds far distant. Reclamationists are ever-eager to integrate with Ancestral Gardener cities, settling them and building upon them in new ways, investigating the wild environments around them and experimenting to see how all this can be spun to support stronger societies.

Almost all cities on the Network are based, at least in part, on Gardener architecture. Some Reclamationists are more zealous in their entitlement than others.

Preservationists
A truly voracious Reclamationist will treat Gardener structures as a foundation, a skeleton of walls, floors and roofs to weave tapestries across, to build new rooms upon, to hollow out alcoves and string bridges from tower to tower. Reclamationist cities are hybrids of style and time, and in some cases it’s even difficult to tell where the modern additions end and the ancient halls begin. Preservationists disdain this broad, insatiable, appropriative approach.

While the Preservationist will still happily live in Ancestral Gardener constructs, and interact with their terraformed environments, they would preach that the interference with these marvellous creations be kept to a minimum. They do not want wandering Gaian hands to bring fresh chaos to the local ecosystems, or to sully the work of the Ancestors in their misguided attempts to “improve” it. Preservationists advocate careful study of the relics found on the Portal Network, but from a safe distance and without getting too eagerly involved – as that’s how species go extinct, and how rediscovered libraries are rendered lost forever. Their societies will closely monitor newcomers who might meddle with their protected territories.

Isolationists
Others still believe that much of the enterprise has been a mistake. Setting up shop in the desolate graveyards of folk long dead? The flowers are a beautiful distraction, this whole thing is tempting too much fate. Isolationists seek to distance themselves from the mistakes of the past, and build their own cities, in some cases their own new gateways on the Network. Some are convicted enough to avoid even worlds terraformed by Gardeners, others are satisfied to merely live distant from the remains of their cities. Isolationists are keen for their achievements in the Portal Morning to stand distinct from our ancestors – indeed, the Gardeners left no instruction, and Gaian success in the modern day should be attributed to Gaians.

Isolationist communities in the Galactic Southwest have experienced more successful trade with alien species, though whether this is a direct result of their isolationism is unproven.

Alien Life
Relations with extraterrestrial sentient beings in the Portal Morning are still informal, infrequent, and often tense. Some Gaians are eager to meet the other creatures of the cosmos with open minds and open arms, even if the other creatures of the cosmos may be less than enthused. Other Gaians just hope they will leave us alone, and others still may be a little too ready to defend their new homes with horrifying lethal force.

Now, though, a Gaian encountering alien life is an ambassador for an entire multi-planetary species. The impression that they leave may have the most startling, chaotic, or dangerous ramifications.

Further expansion shall be given to Gaian-Alien relations in future releases with far-reaching effects; this should be borne in mind when dealing with sentient alien life.