The Facts

To understand the H’meen and the planet Tee’Rha itself better, it is recommendable to read the below facts. These are just the basic facts one needs to be able to communicate with the H’meen, and to understand their way of living. More historical facts will be added at a later stage.

Fact Sheet: Tee’Rha.

– Tee’Rha is very much like Earth and even more so like Terrus Secondus, better known as’ Two’: At about four times the size of Earth, it has very similar atmospheric conditions: Like Two, it also has three moons, which balance out the gravity to be about twelve percent heavier than Earth’s.

– Tee’Rha has three moons; two of them, Ees (like Two’s moon Kerberos, covered in ice for about 65%) and W’tuur, a so called Water planet consisting of almost 97% water, are colonised by the H’meen. Strangely enough, no H’meen star ships, or any engine propelled vehicles for that matter, were ever found during the realisation of the early Human settlements.

– Both Ees and W’tuur have an atmosphere but hardly enough for Humans to remain exposed to it longer than an hour or so. After that period, the brain rapidly starts to shut down to maintain minimal power for crucial functions (think heart and lungs). The human body can however survive several hours on W’tuur, once it has gone into hibernation. Ees is too cold, with an average temperature of -12 degrees Celsius.

Anybody who wants to visit W’tuur for a nice water vacation, had best gone to World of Lakes, as in comparison to swimming on W’tuur, power lifting is a walk in the park. The lack of a ‘normal’ atmosphere makes that water appears lighter than human tissue, therefore it really takes a lot of effort to keep afloat.

The third moon is nothing more than an oversized rock, called S’toon, There is no atmosphere, the place is absolutely uninhabitable.

– Tee’Rha consists of seven Continents, known as the Seven Worlds:

Forest World; One of the largest Continents of Tee’Rha, also known as The Lungs of Tee’Rha.

World of Lakes; Although the Continent is surrounded by a nine to twenty-eight mile wide strip of land, the interior of it is covered by lakes, scattered across the Continent.

Upper Ice World: the Tee’Rhan North Pole.

Lower Ice World: the Tee’Rhan South Pole.

Desert World: South of the Equator lies the Continent of Deserts. The inhabitants live in the Oases in the midst of the Deserts. Some of the oases are as large as the Brittanies on Earth.

Mountain World; this is where the highest Mountains on Tee’Rha are situated. Some reach as high as 9 clicks above sea level.

World of Islands; the Islands Continent consists of somewhere around 3000 islands, some as large as the Chinese Empire on Earth, others barely large enough to build a dwelling on. Though technically not a Continent, the sheer size of the group of Islands, and the size of some of the individual islands justify the name ‘Continent’.

– The inhabitants of Tee’Rha are the H’meen (pronounced: Huh-Maine). Females are known as W’meen (Wuh -Maine), males are Meen. The planet is very much a ‘Men’s World’, even though the majority of the population is female; about 1 in every 45 born babies is male… Although being a Men’s World, it seems the W’meen select the Meen they want to get partnered up with (which is as much as getting married), or with whom they choose to be in Unity (have a child from). It’s not uncommon to have a child from a Meen who is in partnership, be it with approval of his Partner (You could say that the term ‘adultery’ as we know it, doesn’t really exist, purely because of the lack of males).

– A bit of math to keep you awake: The H’meen time keeping is much like ours on Earth; they have Cycles (Years), Moons (Months) and Suns (Days). They do not have weeks like we know them. The Tee’Rhan Cycle is 12 Moons (The beginning of a Moon is when the three moons are perfectly aligned), a Moon is 38 Suns. The days -Suns- are 28.30 Earth hours. Hence, a Tee’Rhan Cycle is just over 1.5 Earth Year. They are living in Cycle 7991 now (which would in Earth years be 12020, or in actual fact their Cycle Count started in the Earth Year 9225 BC). So much for the math… Every start of the new Month, or Moon, is celebrated with a ‘Feast of the Moons’, when the three Moons are perfectly aligned.

– Although there are differences in their writing (They very much write phonetic) due to the many dialects, most H’meen speak what we think of as mixed-up English, the official name for the language is T’oong’uu. Speaking T’oong’uu is easier than writing; most words are or resemble English but the grammar, and in many cases the spelling, is completely mashed up.

– The real Tee’Rhan language buffs are also the people who ‘rule’ the place, together with a number of Master and Prime Thinkers (see notes on Thinkers). Together they form the Konsulei, freely translated the Elders, or the Council. The oldest member is most commonly but not per definition the Spokesman for the Konsulei; you won’t find many Konsulei that have a genuine ‘Leader’. The ‘government’ of Tee’Rha is in hands of the Grand Konsulei. They don’t actually govern the continents but merely provide guide lines to the local Konsulei as to how the Community should or rather, could be lead. In most Communities these guide lines are however followed to the letter.

– The day-to-day management of the Grand Konsulei is commonly in hands of the group of longest sitting local Konsulei spokesmen, there are however exceptions to the rule. The seats of the Grand Konsulei are normally accepted voluntarily. In other words, new members are selected and invited by the sitting members. Rule is that age goes before popularity in the selection stage and again, with exceptions.

– There are no signs of Religion on Tee’Rha; it makes one think of Tee’Rha as a large Hippie Commune, all Love and Peace; there is no distinction of any kind. It is said there will most likely be fractions here and there on Tee’Rha which are still followers of some form of Religion, they are however not known or controlled by the Grand Konsulei. Never had anyone or any Community had the urge to interfere with either of these Religious Groups, nor do the religious groups bring in members under force.

– Some H’meen have the ability to transport themselves through use of their brain; they are known as ‘Thinkers’ -see notes on Thinkers- As opposed to Humans and the common H’meen, they have a higher percentage of brain usage. In other words, where we use our brain to create and use tools, the H’meen use their brain as their (multi) tool. (In the Dark ages on Earth, people with similar abilities were referred to and prosecuted as Witches…)

– There are all sorts of Thinkers, divided in four categories: Thinkers, Master Thinkers, Prime Thinkers and the Ultimum Thinkers, all of whom have different abilities. As earlier mentioned, there are Master Thinkers who have the ability to transport themselves to other places. (There is however one dangerous side to Thinkers transporting themselves: If they transport themselves into a massive substance, like a wall, or a tree or such, they won’t be able to transport themselves out.) Some of the strongest (Prime) Thinkers are also able to transport other people. There is one level which isn’t mentioned; the Ultimum Thinker. They possess all abilities, to a stronger, more powerful level than the Primes; however this is, as far as known, from word of mouth. Their existence could very possibly even be explained as a legend…

– The Master and Prime Thinkers can stun you with their mind waves, the Primes (Thinkers with an enormous amount of brain energy) can even ‘dismiss’ (kill, in the sense of ‘Humane Euthanasia’) you with them. Needless to say what an Ultimum can do to you…

– So far there has been no record of a Thinker of Ultimum magnitude the last 300 Cycles (They are said to have absolute, 100% control over their brain). It appears to be very rare to find Prime Thinkers younger than 40 Cycles and equally so, there aren’t really a lot of known facts on The Ultimum, rare as they come.

– The Thinker ability is genetically passed on from Mother to Daughter and from Father to Son. The actual actions, ‘Thinking’, are commonly explained as ‘being in thought’.

– It is said that not one of the predators on Tee’Rha have ever attacked, or even tried to attack the H’meen since the early Thinkers stunned and eventually dismissed complete herds of them. Folklore tells us that an Ultimum once whispered something in a predator’s ear, making such an impression on the beast, they’ve since refrained from coming near H’meen.

– Most of the predators higher in the food chain than H’meen live in the Equatorial areas of Tee’Rha.

– Violence is the biggest NO-NO on Tee’Rha. Being violent, in any sense of the word, could be penalised with house-arrest -the most commonly used form of sentencing- without visitors other than the people living in the house. This could be as long as ten Cycles and in the most extreme cases the perpetrator is sentenced to ‘dismission’ (execution).

However, to get ‘dismissed’ you’d have to at least have killed half a city’s inhabitants or something similar. So far known there has been only one case where a Master Thinker abused his abilities for his own benefit. It took the Grand Konsulei seven Cycles to track him down and to sentence him to dismissal.

– Comparing time-set in sense of building and fashion: Tee’Rha looks like Earth in the early 19^th Century, with the difference that the H’meen show a better taste of fashion; more up-to-date, it is said to be late 20^th Century Earth-like, without the comfort of buttons, zippers and of course the everlasting Velcro. It’s all traditionally tied neatly with cords and laces.

– The Tee’Rhan Monetary Unit is called the Duq, named after one of the pioneers after the Great War, D’uuq. One Duq is 50 onelings, which is about 42 Earth Cents.

– Funny thing: You’ll notice that a lot of Tee’Rha’s Geographical and personal names almost sound the same as similar places and names on Earth… There is no resemblance though.