"Three standard years spent orbiting such a rich abundance of sea life as to beggar belief. Three standard years of constant experimentation, straining the patience of my lords and patrons. Three standard years of knowing that millions suffer throughout this sector for want of food. Three standard years of failure. Our latest submersible was destroyed today, a thousand men lost in an instant to the titanic mouth of a Lantern Jaw. This world may not hate us, but it surely hates our works. It matters not. I will find a way. If it takes a millennia, I will find a way."
- — From the early personal data-files of Magos Genetus Halix Redole
The "Complete Ocean" of Spectoris, an ocean-covered Agri-world in the Calixis Sector of the Segmentum Obscurus, is the subject of many legends. Some say there are sentient xenos forms of vast size inhabiting the unexplored watery depths of the world. Others claim that the world-ocean itself is sentient.
When the Lord Militant Golgenna Angevin's world surveyors first discovered the Ocean World of Spectoris, they were delighted by the vast quantities of fish that the planet seemed to promise and readily noted it as a potential Agri-world for future aquacultural development. As the human population of the Calixis Sector grew in the centuries after Lord Militant Angevin's conquest of it, so to did its need for food. In 312.M41 the Sector Governor declared that the time had come to begin harvesting the piscine crop of Spectoris, a task that was to prove far easier to order than to achieve. The Imperium soon found that the native denizens of Spectoris' seas routinely destroyed all foreign objects that were placed within the world-ocean, effectively halting any large-scale collection efforts. For decades the legendary "Complete Ocean" held the settlers of the Imperium at bay, leading many to believe that the world-ocean itself was sentient in some inexplicable manner.
At last, frustrated by their inability to progress the world's colonisation and development, the Adeptus Mechanicus turned to one of their more eclectically-minded members, the somewhat infamous Genetor Halix Redole. Genetor Redole was known to be associated with a faction within the Mechanicus known as the Organicists, a group of Tech-priests who esteemed biological enhancement as being equal in value with the cybernetic, a somewhat radical if not heretical position among the adherents of the Cult Mechanicus. Redole applied his keen intellect to the "Spectoris Problem" for five standard years before hitting upon a solution. The Genetor discovered that a form of Sectorin sea life roughly analogous to terrestrial coral was attracted to certain chemicals. By blending the chemicals with a bonding agent derived from a Spectorin fish, Redole created the compound known as Coral Paste. The paste draws Spectorin coral to whatever it is applied to, soon creating a "natural" layer of sea life that causes the creatures of the world-ocean to regard the encrusted vessel as native. The Genetor's success opened the way to large-scale Imperial harvesting and development of the world and Coral Paste is now regularly applied to all Spectorin sea-going ships, no matter their size, as well as being repeatedly caked across the entire hull of the planet's sole underwater habitat, Enkaidan. Coral Paste has proven to be useful to the colonists of Spectoris as a makeshift hull repair agent on a number of occasions. Its utility is marred by the fact that it must be reapplied frequently, else the coral covering can deteriorate with lethal results. Coral Paste is a highly regulated substance due to the extreme value of a great many Spectorin species of fish, which inevitably brings poachers to the planet.
Departmento Cartographicae Planetary Database
- Galactic Position: 88/23/CS/SW
- Equatorial Circumference: 17,500 Terran miles
- Class: Agri-world (producing aquacultural crops like fish and seafood)
- Years and Days: Spectoris takes 388 Terran days to orbit its star and spins on its axis every 24.6 Terran hours
- Population: 2,000,000
- Mean Surface Temperature: 35° Celsius
- Tropospheric Composition: Nitrogen 72%, Oxygen 25%, Argon 1%, Ozone 1%, Carbon Dioxide 0.5%
- Climatic Regions: The entire surface of Spectoris is covered in a planetary ocean
- Native Flora and Fauna: A variety of animals and plants live in the seas of Spectoris; the vast majority of them form a vast planktonic soup drifting in the great ocean. The Lantern Jaw is the largest predator in the Calixis Sector. It is a vast, eel-like piscine xeno-form over 200 metres long indigenous to Spectoris.
- Economy: The population of Spectoris mostly live on vast farming rigs, tethered to submerged reef or rocks by numerous cables. The people of Spectoris refer to their currency as "Scales" or "Fins," and being particularly flush with cash is often colloquially referred to as having a "shoal of fins" or looking a bit "scaly."
- Principle Exports: Spectoris is the Calixis Sector's largest exporter of fish and fish-meal product.
- Countries and Continents: None. Enkaidan -- Spectoris' sole Imperial habitat, is located on a submarine peak.
- Imperial Guard Recruitment: Spectoris is not expected to raise any regiments of Imperial Guard beyond their Planetary Defence Force. The population's farming work is considered an important enough service to the Emperor.
- Contact with Other Worlds: Spectoris sends shipments of food to many other worlds in the Calixis Sector. There are relatively stable Warp routes linking Spectoris to Tranch and Sentinel.
Sources
- Dark Heresy: Core Rulebook (RPG), pg. 326
- Dark Heresy: The Inquisitor's Handbook (RPG), pg. 155
- Guide to the Calixis Sector (PDF)