Heritage Universe

The Heritage Universe is a fictional setting created by Charles Sheffield for a series of science fiction novels. The date of the setting is several thousand years into the future, during a time when human space colonization has filled much of the local spiral arm of the galaxy. The primary feature of this universe are a series of immense engineering artifacts constructed by an ancient race referred to as The Builders. The Builders, however, are no longer visibly present in the universe.

Books

Books in the Heritage Universe include:

*"Summertide" ("book 1")
*"Divergence" ("book 2")
**"Convergent Series" - Compilation of books 1 and 2.
*"Transcendence" ("book 3")
**"The Heritage Universe" - Compilation of books 1, 2, and 3.
*"Convergence" ("book 4")
**"Transvergence" - Compilation of books 3 and 4, often listed as a 6th book of the Heritage Universe.
*"Resurgence" ("book 5")

One common thread between all the books in the series is the exploration of one or more Builder artifacts. Interestingly, each exploration reveals new and previously unknown facts about the Builders and leads the characters to speculate about the nature of the Builders and their current whereabouts. Each book ends with a very different conclusion based upon the newly discovered evidence. It would appear from the Foreword to "Convergence" by Sheffield that even he couldn't decide what the Builders should be.

Characters

Hans Rebka

Hans Rebka holds a semi-official job of "troubleshooter" in the Phemus Circle. The position seems to entail being assigned an area or problem to solve and then doing whatever possible to solve the problem. In "Summertide", Rebka is sent to the planet Opal to help Maxwell Perry, a fellow troubleshooter, get out of a long-term funk. During this time, he meets most of the other characters in the series and experiences the events on Opal and Quake that lead to the discovery of the artifacts Glister and Serenity in "Divergence".

During "Divergence", "Transcendence", and "Convergence" Rebka and Lang are romantically involved, though this romance goes on hiatus and is tenuously resolved in "Resurgence".

Rebka was born and raised on the planet Teufel, of the Phemus Circle, and is often known to quote the most famous saying about Teufel, "What sins must a man commit, in how many past lives, to be born on Teufel?" He also occasionally reminisces or relates situations to childhood experiences of growing up and learning to survive on Teufel. In particular, the task of retrieving water as a child while facing the Remouleur dawn wind, which would have killed him if he hadn't timed every move exactly.

Between "Convergence" and "Resurgence" Rebka attempts to overthrow the government of the Phemus Circle because it allows for the rich aristocracy to survive in extreme comfort. It forces the poor of their planets to face horrible and nearly unsurvivable circumstances rather than spending their money and effort on attempting to make the Circle a better place for all.

Darya Lang

Professor Darya Lang is a renowned researcher and Builder expert best-known for her work on the "Lang Universal Artifact Catalog", the definitive reference on known Builder artifacts in the Orion arm of the galaxy. She is a fellow at the Artifact Research Institute on Sentinel Gate.

During "Summertide", Lang has discovered a strange concidence in the pattern of modifications occurring in Builder artifacts all over the local spiral arm, which leads her to visit Quake at the height of the summertide. She briefly forms an alliance with the cecropian, Atvar H'sial, before Atvar betrays her to partner with Louis Nenda. Lang is eventually rescued by Rebka and his team, who witness the discovery of the artifact Glister as it lifts from under the surface of Quake and heads toward the system's gas giant, Mandel.

In "Divergence", Lang works with Rebka to explore Glister, which leads the discover of Serenity, 30,000 light years above the galactic plane. In "Transcendence", after returning to the Institute, she decides to go with the rest of the team to explore the Torvil Anfract, which turns out to be a Builder artifact.

In "Convergence", she's briefly shown up at the Institute by a fellow artifact expert, Quintus Bloom, who has recently discovered an allegedly new artifact, Labyrinth. She then goes to challenge his new theories by exploring Labyrinth itself shortly before it and all other artifacts in the Orion arm vanish.

In "Resurgence", Lang joins the others once again to search for artifacts in the Sagittarius Arm of the galaxy.

Louis Nenda

Louis Nenda is a scoundrel and criminal from the Zardalu Communion. Throughout the books it is hinted that he's committed some terrible, possibly genocidal crime, but which is never revealed and he's not entirely comfortable with. Despite being a scoundrel, most of his behavior in the books is respectable, with a few deviations. There exists consistent sexual tension between Nenda and Darya Lang throughout the books, even while Lang is involved with Rebka. He also owns Kalik as his slave.

Perhaps the most unusual trait of Louis Nenda is the bionic implants he's received to allow him to communicate pheromonally with species able to communicate that way, mainly Cecropians. Because of this, Nenda is able to forge a long term business relationship with Atvar H'sial that lasts for the duration of all books in the series.

In "Summertide", Nenda comes to the Opal/Quake planetary system because his slave, Kalik, has performed calculations similar to Lang's and discovered the same anomaly that points to the planet Quake. Nenda partners with Atvar H'sial after Atvar abandons Lang on the surface of Quake so that they can work together to reap the benefits of witnessing a major Builder event together. In the end, they are "kidnapped" by the new artifact Glister as it moved away from Quake to orbit the gas giant Mandel.

In "Divergence", Nenda is instrumental in defeating the Zardalu on the artifact Serenity. In "Transcendence", he is responsible for finding the pilot that takes them into the Torvil Anfract and becomes stranded with Atvar H'sial on the planet Genizee. In "Convergence", Nenda and Atvar escape from Genizee with a Zardalu, which they take back to the Fourth Alliance to collect a reward for finding a live Zardalu specimen, since recent events showed the Zardalu to be alive even though thought to be extinct. In a search for Lang, Nenda leads a team to explore the Torvil Anfract before it collapses and takes them to Labyrinth. In "Resurgence", Nenda joins the whole team once again to explore artifacts recently discovered in the Sagittarius arm of the galaxy.

Atvar H'sial

EC Tally

Julian Graves

Kalik

J'merlia

Races

Humans

Cecropians

Zardalu

Builder Artifacts

Cocoon

Elephant is a large gaseous mass, approximately 4,000 kilometers in length and no wider than 900 kilometers at any point. It isn't strictly a gaseous mass as it is constructed of stable polymer fibers and transfer ducts. Elephant can function as a large general purpose computing device. It has been used extensively in applications requiring enormous storage and moderate computing speed.

The whole system is able to repair any damage to itself by reconfiguring or synthesizing and replicating its parts. Any piece of Elephant that is removed loses its function.

It has been speculated that Elephant could be a sentient construct. However, there is no definitive evidence on the subject.

Glister

The Glister artifact is discovered at the end of Summertide as it and another artifact (unnamed) are ejected from the mantle of Quake. Louis Nenda's ship (carrying Atvar H'sial and Nenda at the time) is "kidnapped" by Glister as it headed into orbit of Gargantua from Quake. The exploration of Glister consumes much of the first part of Divergence. Within Glister is a Builder transportation vortex which leads to the artifact Serenity.

Iceworld

This artifact is discovered in the Sagittarius Arm of the galaxy during Resurgence. This artifact is externally similar to Glister.

Labyrinth

This artifact was discovered by Quintus Bloom and announced at Lang's research institute during Convergence. Darya Lang, with the help of Kallik and J'merlia, explores the interior of Labyrinth shortly before it and all other Builder artifacts in the Orion arm of the galaxy vanish.

Lens

Phages are found in and around many Builder artifacts. Whether or not they are actually constructs of the Builders is sometimes disputed, but the general consensus is that the phages were constructed by the Builders, but only because they are associated with so many Builder artifacts.

All phages seen until Rebka, Lang, and the other explorers explored a series of new artifacts, were identical. All phages known to that point had the form of regular dodecahedrons at 48 meters to a side. The surface was a roughly textured uniform gray, with mass sensors on the edge of each face. At the center of each face is a maw that can be opened to ingest objects up to 30 meters in radius.

Any object entering the maw (including many explorers) is consumed without altering the mass of the phage. Explorers Sawyer and S'kropa fed one a large solid silicaceous fragment with a 25 meter radius and 425 kilometers in length. The phage consumed 1 kilometer of the material per day and did not have any detectable change in mass.

Phage avoidance systems are now standard equipment when exploring Builder artifacts. Until Rebka, Lang, and the other explorers began their exploration of Glister, phages were only known to travel approximately one to two meters per standard day, relative to the local frame. No phage was known to have exceeded a velocity of one meter per hour.

During the exploration of Glister in Divergence, phages were seen to move at very high velocity as the explorers approached and landed upon the surface of Glister. The phages had the appearance of being agitated at the explorer's presence and swooped down upon them as they explored. One was even found to have destroyed itself by smashing into the surface of Glister. The sentient Builder construct on the artifact Serenity stated that the phages are actually the stupified remnant of the Builders. The construct speculated that the Builders grew tired of the uniform sameness of existence and seemed to become dysfunctional. This theory was later discounted by Darya Lang in Transcendence.

During the exploration of Labyrinth in Resurgence, just prior to the disappearance of that artifact and all the other artifacts in the Orion arm, hundreds or thousands of small phages (approximately the size of the human hand) guided the explorers in Labyrinth away from the artifact before it vanished into a massive Builder transportation vortex.

entinel

The Sentinel artifact is visible from the Ryders-M system (and, in particular, from the planet Sentinel Gate). The artifact is a large, dimly glowing energy field shaped in a perfect sphere with a diameter of 3.2 light-seconds. The interior of the sphere is inaccessible, but is permeable by electromagnetic radiation on certain wave lengths. Light traveling through the sphere requires approximately 4.2 light-minutes, suggesting that the space-time within is not simply connected.

Inside the sphere is a large object known as the Pyramid, a tetrahedral structure thought to be an enormous library.

The Sentinel artifact appears in the books as an object clearly visible from the planet Sentinel Gate on a few occasions. It is briefly and partially examined up close during "Convergence" by Darya Lang, Kalik, and J'merlia. Shortly after, Sentinel vanishes from the local spiral arm along with all other known artifacts following Lang, Kalik, and J'merlia's exploration of Labyrinth.

erenity

The artifact named Serenity is discovered during Divergence after Lang, Rebka, and the others enter a Builder transportation vortex in Glister. Serenity is a massive artifact set 30,000 light-years above the galactic plane. While on Serenity, the explorers find a collection of Zardalu being held in stasis, which are subsequently wakened by the sentient Builder construct aboard Serenity.

Torvil Anfract

The Torvil Anfract is not listed as a Builder artifact until after the exploration by Lang, Rebka, and the other explorers in their search for Genizee, the home planet of the Zardalu. It is thought that the planet must be in the center of this complex are of space as the home planet of the Zardalu was never found since that race was completely annihilated (or nearly so) millennia earlier.

During the exploration of the Anfract during Transcendence, the explorers do, in fact, find the planet Genizee nested within the center along with a large orbital artifact. They also discover that the interior of the planet of Genizee is itself an artifact.

Umbilical

The Umbilical is one of the few artifacts with an obvious and easily understood purpose. It is a transportation system that connects the two planets Quake and Opal. On the Opal end, the Umbilical is permanently tethered to the seabed. On the Quake end, it is electromagnetically connected to the surface, but this end is disconnected and automatically retracted from the surface each time the orbit of the Dobelle system makes its closest approach to Mandel (every 1.43 standard years). This period is called "Summertide."

There is a local space-time singularity called "the Winch," which is involved in this retraction. How this system works or is driven, is unknown.

This artifact is very important in the book "Summertide". Hans Rebka, Darya Lang, and others in their party become trapped on the surface of Quake during Summertide when the Umbilical retracts before they can return after conducting a search and rescue on Quake's surface.

Clades

The different collections of planets in the Heritage Universe are called "clades". There are three major clades and one minor clade in the Orion arm of the galaxy. The major clades are the Fourth Alliance, the Cecropia Federation, and the Zardalu Communion. The minor clade is a group of planets on the border of all three clades, called the Phemus Circle.

The clades are not governed in the formal sense as maintaining government across solar systems is, in the Heritage Universe, not totally possible. Rather, they are groups of planetary systems that recognize common authorities. The Fourth Alliance, Phemus Circle, and Cecropia Federation also recognize a central authority in the Ethical Council, of which Julian Graves is a member.

Fourth Alliance

Cecropia Federation

Zardalu Communion

Phemus Circle

Planets

Deadworld

Genizee

Home world of the Zardalu protected by two singularities

Mandel

Miranda

Opal

Quake

entinel Gate

Teufel