(Spoiler!) What's Next for the Honorverse?(Spoiler Warning!)

I loved the ending of UH. It ended as it began, a story illustrating duty and sacrifice. It began with Honor accepting her duty to command a nearly castrated warship and demoralized crew. The story ends with her completely spent with nothing left to sacrifice on the alter of not only duty but also to the demon that yearns to discard her humanity. She is saved from to choosing that horrible fate or death with Hamish's survival. Just wonderful!

Now what? Where will the story go now? We have played with this topic for several years now. David has given us the last installment of the first arc, now where will he likely go?

Plays with Fire and Indiana Graham appear to be the heirs apparant to Zilwicki and Cachat. They will be the ones chasing the MAlign. One suspects that Indy will have more than a little cachet as the son of a principle leader of the indepndent state of Serhaphim. That he is amongst the leadership of the angels will serve him well in his courtship of Abigail Hearns.

Mike and Lester appear to be leading the charge to integrate the Havenite and Imperial navies. Their relationship will grow more ......intimate as well.

Terekov and the Saganami crew will build the Quadrant into an Imperial regional headquarters for the eastern half of the explored galaxy.

Honor appears to want to focus on her family. Given her nature, I doubt she can stay away from her responsibilities to the people of her Duchy and Steading. That will likely mean utilizing the resources of her demesne to improve her subjects' lives.

-Skydomes will likely expand to building hazardous evironment habitats in systems like Nuncio. Several times in UH we read of less than perfect planetary climates where parts of a habitable planet is uninhabitable. Skydomes can make that sort of realestate habitable. Great opportunities to build rather than destroy.

-Duchy of Harrington is largely a resort location. The expertise of her tennant vacation cartels can lend itself to propective vacation hot spots like Nuncio. I can see Swallow as another expansion area.

-Benton-Ramierez y Chou clan appears to be looking for purpose in this generation. Honor's grandmother is hardly decrepit, but is slowing down. They are uber-wealthy and are scions of medical sciences. Gathering her family, what remains of them, to another grand purpose seems like what they would all need. Providing consultancy and development services/investment for medical infrastructure seems right up their alley. This would also provide a response to the soul crushing deaths of the Beowulf orbital habitats.

I suspect that the Hauptmans would be more than willing to partner with the Duchess and Steadholder. Yes, they are also hurting, but they will recover and need to adjust their diversification strategies. Mike, Cathy Montaigne and Steadholder Owen would also likely partner with Honor on many of these endeavors. One suspects that Eloise Prichart will gladly participate once her 3 sequential presidential terms end.

So, when the story resumes I suspect Elizabeth will be calling Honor back to military service after a decade or two of building up star systems all around the galaxy. Her kids will be newly graduated from either Saganami Island or Beowulf's top school. I somehow doubt that all her children will go military. Most, yes, but not all.

The geopolitical environment will be interesting. Manticore and Haven will be part of a federal structure that includes; Beowulf and her daughter colonies, the Quadrant and likely additional Fringe, Verge and ex-Protectorate systems in the region, Silesia and some of not all of the old Manticoran Alliance nations. This new federated polity will have something in the neighborhood of 400-500 star systems of Core worlds as well as less developed systems from all over the galaxy.

Furthermore, they will have alliance relationships with perhaps as many as 500 more star systems. I doubt the new polity will control the same percentage of Wormhole junctions as they do currently. I suspect they will control around 2/3 of the wormholes in the galaxy either as part of the polity or through treaties.

Under these circumstances, I wonder what sorts of friction will arise as the causi beli for the next story arc? Genetic slavery will be pretty much outlawed and Manpower will be gone. Without the labs and creches, how will the industry continue? Not likely. I doubt the MAlign will continue the production of slaves, but will still run their experiments for their eugenics program.

Tradtional geopolitical motives like territory and economics? Sure, but economic competition is far less interesting a story to read about. Territorial conflict? Sure, the Renaissance Factor will but heads with the new federated polity, but how will any reasonable disagreement morph into open warfare? Not likely.

I think the plot has to involve Darius insisting on destroying Harrington, Beowulf and all their works. By attacking from the shadows, they eventually expose themselves too much. I further suspect that the MAlign will be encouraging more than a few worlords to muck up the works. Seeing how the RF will try to act the noble star nation while letting the worlords screw over the Empire wherever possible will be a fun story to read.

PeterZ wrote:I loved the ending of UH. It ended as it began, a story illustrating duty and sacrifice. It began with Honor accepting her duty to command a nearly castrated warship and demoralized crew. The story ends with her completely spent with nothing left to sacrifice on the alter of not only duty but also to the demon that yearns to discard her humanity. She is saved from to choosing that horrible fate or death with Hamish's survival. Just wonderful!

Now what? Where will the story go now? We have played with this topic for several years now. David has given us the last installment of the first arc, now where will he likely go?

Plays with Fire and Indiana Graham appear to be the heirs apparant to Zilwicki and Cachat. They will be the ones chasing the MAlign. One suspects that Indy will have more than a little cachet as the son of a principle leader of the indepndent state of Serhaphim. That he is amongst the leadership of the angels will serve him well in his courtship of Abigail Hearns.

Mike and Lester appear to be leading the charge to integrate the Havenite and Imperial navies. Their relationship will grow more ......intimate as well.

Terekov and the Saganami crew will build the Quadrant into an Imperial regional headquarters for the eastern half of the explored galaxy.

Honor appears to want to focus on her family. Given her nature, I doubt she can stay away from her responsibilities to the people of her Duchy and Steading. That will likely mean utilizing the resources of her demesne to improve her subjects' lives.

-Skydomes will likely expand to building hazardous evironment habitats in systems like Nuncio. Several times in UH we read of less than perfect planetary climates where parts of a habitable planet is uninhabitable. Skydomes can make that sort of realestate habitable. Great opportunities to build rather than destroy.

-Duchy of Harrington is largely a resort location. The expertise of her tennant vacation cartels can lend itself to propective vacation hot spots like Nuncio. I can see Swallow as another expansion area.

-Benton-Ramierez y Chou clan appears to be looking for purpose in this generation. Honor's grandmother is hardly decrepit, but is slowing down. They are uber-wealthy and are scions of medical sciences. Gathering her family, what remains of them, to another grand purpose seems like what they would all need. Providing consultancy and development services/investment for medical infrastructure seems right up their alley. This would also provide a response to the soul crushing deaths of the Beowulf orbital habitats.

I suspect that the Hauptmans would be more than willing to partner with the Duchess and Steadholder. Yes, they are also hurting, but they will recover and need to adjust their diversification strategies. Mike, Cathy Montaigne and Steadholder Owen would also likely partner with Honor on many of these endeavors. One suspects that Eloise Prichart will gladly participate once her 3 sequential presidential terms end.

So, when the story resumes I suspect Elizabeth will be calling Honor back to military service after a decade or two of building up star systems all around the galaxy. Her kids will be newly graduated from either Saganami Island or Beowulf's top school. I somehow doubt that all her children will go military. Most, yes, but not all.

The geopolitical environment will be interesting. Manticore and Haven will be part of a federal structure that includes; Beowulf and her daughter colonies, the Quadrant and likely additional Fringe, Verge and ex-Protectorate systems in the region, Silesia and some of not all of the old Manticoran Alliance nations. This new federated polity will have something in the neighborhood of 400-500 star systems of Core worlds as well as less developed systems from all over the galaxy.

Furthermore, they will have alliance relationships with perhaps as many as 500 more star systems. I doubt the new polity will control the same percentage of Wormhole junctions as they do currently. I suspect they will control around 2/3 of the wormholes in the galaxy either as part of the polity or through treaties.

Under these circumstances, I wonder what sorts of friction will arise as the causi beli for the next story arc? Genetic slavery will be pretty much outlawed and Manpower will be gone. Without the labs and creches, how will the industry continue? Not likely. I doubt the MAlign will continue the production of slaves, but will still run their experiments for their eugenics program.

Tradtional geopolitical motives like territory and economics? Sure, but economic competition is far less interesting a story to read about. Territorial conflict? Sure, the Renaissance Factor will but heads with the new federated polity, but how will any reasonable disagreement morph into open warfare? Not likely.

I think the plot has to involve Darius insisting on destroying Harrington, Beowulf and all their works. By attacking from the shadows, they eventually expose themselves too much. I further suspect that the MAlign will be encouraging more than a few worlords to muck up the works. Seeing how the RF will try to act the noble star nation while letting the worlords screw over the Empire wherever possible will be a fun story to read.

A few of the points are a bit ludicrous. No way Indiana replaces Z and C. Zilwicki is a computer genius and Cachat a genius at creating chaos. Indiana is a good kid, very brave, with not a lot of training.

Let him marry Abigail and have kids. Also, having a cat around does get a bit in the way of espionage. Can't disguise them all that well.

I think in 20 years most of the top leaders we see now will not be running the navy. Most are older, in some cases significantly older, than Honor. And, of course, a few are dead. Henke has been fighting as long as Honor.

I think Michael Oversteegan and Terekhov will be at the very top.

Quick guess: the first book will have Raoul at the Academy or on a snotty cruise. He will, of course, have been adopted by a treecat, possibly more than one.

He will have problems because of his mother and his position: he might have a title or two already. We never have learned if Grantville has children.

ldwechsler wrote:A few of the points are a bit ludicrous. No way Indiana replaces Z and C. Zilwicki is a computer genius and Cachat a genius at creating chaos. Indiana is a good kid, very brave, with not a lot of training.

Let him marry Abigail and have kids. Also, having a cat around does get a bit in the way of espionage. Can't disguise them all that well.

I think in 20 years most of the top leaders we see now will not be running the navy. Most are older, in some cases significantly older, than Honor. And, of course, a few are dead. Henke has been fighting as long as Honor.

I think Michael Oversteegan and Terekhov will be at the very top.

Quick guess: the first book will have Raoul at the Academy or on a snotty cruise. He will, of course, have been adopted by a treecat, possibly more than one.

He will have problems because of his mother and his position: he might have a title or two already. We never have learned if Grantville has children.

Indy doesn't replace their skillset, he and Firebrand replaces their characters in the story. The researchers won't be playing spy games for big, nasty multi-system polities. They will be investigating leads for any sign of the MAlign. Most likely, they will be investigating in the Honorverse's third world and developing nations. Both of these characters have solid experience working in that sort of environment.

These two are not trying to infliltrate anyone or any group at first. They are tracking down leads. I suspect that inflitration is out of the question now that Firebrand has the treecat. Maybe they'll even bring McKenzie into the search. She has computer chops as I understand it. Later, once they discover enough leads, will they look to inflitrate possible front organizations. By the time the next story arc begins, Indy and McKenzie may have learned a thing or two about clandestine operations.

As I recall Victor was a street thug at one time and learned the ropes from Kevin Usher. How is Indy any different learning from Damien?

PeterZ wrote:

ldwechsler wrote:A few of the points are a bit ludicrous. No way Indiana replaces Z and C. Zilwicki is a computer genius and Cachat a genius at creating chaos. Indiana is a good kid, very brave, with not a lot of training.

Let him marry Abigail and have kids. Also, having a cat around does get a bit in the way of espionage. Can't disguise them all that well.

I think in 20 years most of the top leaders we see now will not be running the navy. Most are older, in some cases significantly older, than Honor. And, of course, a few are dead. Henke has been fighting as long as Honor.

I think Michael Oversteegan and Terekhov will be at the very top.

Quick guess: the first book will have Raoul at the Academy or on a snotty cruise. He will, of course, have been adopted by a treecat, possibly more than one.

He will have problems because of his mother and his position: he might have a title or two already. We never have learned if Grantville has children.

Indy doesn't replace their skillset, he and Firebrand replaces their characters in the story. The researchers won't be playing spy games for big, nasty multi-system polities. They will be investigating leads for any sign of the MAlign. Most likely, they will be investigating in the Honorverse's third world and developing nations. Both of these characters have solid experience working in that sort of environment.

These two are not trying to infliltrate anyone or any group at first. They are tracking down leads. I suspect that inflitration is out of the question now that Firebrand has the treecat. Maybe they'll even bring McKenzie into the search. She has computer chops as I understand it. Later, once they discover enough leads, will they look to inflitrate possible front organizations. By the time the next story arc begins, Indy and McKenzie may have learned a thing or two about clandestine operations.

As I recall Victor was a street thug at one time and learned the ropes from Kevin Usher. How is Indy any different learning from Damien?

Victor went to the Haven School for Agents...or whatever it is called. Remember his line about being the fourth highest ever in resistance to pain?

A lot of folks won't be in the next arc. We have that now. We didn't have Ginger and Wanderman for more than a few books. In this last one, we didn't have Helen Paolo or Terekhov.

Having a few around in the next arc would be nice but I would guess most with just more or less disappear. Perhaps covered with a sentence or two or not.

Or they can be used as the one off characters used to keep the story moving. So, it's Ginger and Aubrey that die is a MAlign ambush. Helen that fights off a Lenny D trying to trash an Alliance star system. All those characters that describe the developing story but are never heard from again.

It's hard to feel anything when those characters buy it or when they succeed. If the reader knows those characters, there exploits become more poignant.

One other thing to consider are the "Ghost Chasers". They know there are Others acting in the entire conflict. The Mesan bombing combined with Beowulf's bombing would be enough circumstantial evidence for them to be convinced the Others have acted against Manticore. They may not be convinced that the Others are the MAlign, but they know Manticore and the SL have been played.

The timing of the Mesan bombing and the Beowulf bombing would suggest that the Others have not been beheaded by the loss of Mesa. However, the viciousness of the Beowulf bombing suggests that there is a deep antipathy towards Beowulf. Who but Mesan groups are as likely to hold such views against Beowulf?

Now, the Solarian League is reconstituted. Those players central to honest covernance will likely be retained in positions of influence. The Ghost Hunters will be chief amongst them. Will these folks give up on their search for the Others? No, they will ask cui bono and expand their search to the surviving players in the international scene. Will this be front and center in their activities? No. It will be an ongoing project.

We know that the alignement wants to improve mankind their way. What happens, if they find out, that Honor is an empath? That would be a big step forward for mankind, so a possible storyline in the future could be the kidnapping of honor and the one or other treecat, maybe combined with a second attack on manticore from the alignement, and the rescueing of her, maybe by one of her kids.

We still don´t know what happend at Silesia as the Andermani and Manticore take control there. So, if we talking about to integrate the Talbott Cluster into the Empire, we have also to talk about to integrate Silesia.

I wonder if they ever give the Torch whormhole a second try. I mean, hom many instable whormholes are in honerverse? The man who discovered the Lynx terminus thought that Torch was safe. Maybe Torch as an independent nation can contact solarian scientist for a second opinion, and if the come to the same result, the whormhole should be working, you can add one and one and came to the result, that the whormhole is safe, but someone secure the other side. And we should remember, that Torch was a world controlled by Mesa, what means the Alignement.

There is text that Beowulf and Hypatia will seek inclusion in the Empire of Manticore. One suspects that some of the 5 independent systems trashed by Buccaneer will also sign up. Cachalot will almost certainly.

Now what happens when the new federal system being discussed to combine the Republic of Haven and the Empire into a single unified polity is worked out? Will some of those systems that seceded from the League seek admission? How many systems in the Fringe will seek admission on similar terms as the Talbot Quadrant or even into the Quadrant? As Core worlds join this new polity, won't the Fringe, Verge and ex-Protectorates worlds view inclusion in one form or another as more attractive?

These possibilities suggest to me that the new Manticoran polity will represent a very large chunk of the antebellum SLN GSP and an even larger chunk of the total Core worlds population. The new polity will control a far larger number of worlds than the Core worlds with a lower average population.

I find it difficult to see how the RF can exceed either the amount of GSP of the new polity in 20-30 years or the population. That suggests to me that there will be other interstellar polities in play. I find the Mayan Co-prosperity Sphere likely to expand as well in the North and East. That leaves due South to the RF. There will be plenty of systems from which smaller independent nations may arise. Which further suggests to me that the story arc can remain much more friendly to single and small unit conflicts and the exciting deathrides those represent.

I use the phrase to describe Maya because I truly believe that Baregos, Roszak or both are either severed A-lines or A-lines that have rejected the Detweiler Plan in some fashion. There is just something in the way RFC describes them when in the POV of the Detweilers or inner onion.

PeterZ wrote:These possibilities suggest to me that the new Manticoran polity will represent a very large chunk of the antebellum SLN GSP and an even larger chunk of the total Core worlds population. The new polity will control a far larger number of worlds than the Core worlds with a lower average population.

There are something like 1000-1500 core worlds. All inhabited for centuries, most with a population greater then that of the entire SKM, and fully industrialized with modern technology.

Which is a long way of of saying, no, you're wrong.

kzt wrote:

PeterZ wrote:These possibilities suggest to me that the new Manticoran polity will represent a very large chunk of the antebellum SLN GSP and an even larger chunk of the total Core worlds population. The new polity will control a far larger number of worlds than the Core worlds with a lower average population.

There are something like 1000-1500 core worlds. All inhabited for centuries, most with a population greater then that of the entire SKM, and fully industrialized with modern technology.

Which is a long way of of saying, no, you're wrong.

You conflate the Shell and the Core worlds with the entire Solarian Leage. The antebellum League is as large as you describe. Including the protectorates the Solarian League is approx 2,000 worlds. The Core worlds number fewer that approx 500 or so.

Including the RoH, Half of Silesia, the Old Manticoran Alliance, the TQ and some portion of the seceding Core worlds as well as some portion of the newly freed protectorates and that's a long way of saying you're wrong.

I assume that between joining the Empire/new polity and committing to an Alliance, the association supporting the future SEM will be as populated or more so than the Old Core world. The GSP will be smaller in the near and medium term.