The Harmony advocates a genetically determined hierarchy, in which all Ekhat will have a place, but in which (for most of them) that place will be subordinate.
To complicate things further, the Harmony is split by an internal division of its own. The True Harmony believes the rankings of the Ekhat species are permanent and fixed. The Complete Harmony believes all Ekhat, no matter how lowly their genetic status at the moment, can eventually be uplifted into "complete Ekhat-dom."
This division, whose ideology is murky from the outside, does have a major impact on the external policies of the different wings of the Harmony. The True Harmony shares the basic attitude of the Melody toward non-Ekhat intelligent species: they are destined for extermination. The Complete Harmony, on the other hand, believes that non-Ekhat species have a place in the universe. The process of uplifting all Ekhat will require replacing the "sub-Ekhat" strains with other intelligent species to, in essence, do the scut work. The flip side of "improving" all Ekhat is to subjugate and enslave all non-Ekhat.
It was this wing of the Harmony which uplifted the Jao into full sentience.
THE INTERDICT
Of all the Ekhat factions, the Interdict is probably the hardest to understand. The closest equivalent in human terms would be something like "fundamentalist, Luddite reactionary fanatics."
The core belief of the Interdict is that the Network was always an abomination. Some human scholars think that the origins of the creed were scientific—i.e., that some Ekhat scientists became convinced the Network was placing a strain on the fabric of spacetime which threatened the universe itself (or at least the portion of the galaxy where it had spread).
Whatever their scientific origins might have been, the Interdict, as it developed during the long years after the Collapse, became something far more in the nature of a mystical cult. From what can be gleaned from their extremely murky writings, the Interdict seems to believe the speed-of-light barrier is "divine" in nature and any attempt to circumvent it is "unholy."
It seems most likely that the Melody's charge against the Interdict is correct: it was they, or at least their ideological predecessors, who launched the civil war which destroyed the Network. In fact, that seems to have been the purpose of the war in the first place.
What is definitely established in the historical record is that it was the Interdict which freed the Jao. Not, of course, because of any concern over the Jao themselves, but simply to strike a blow at the Complete Harmony. It was they, as well, who provided the Jao with the initial technology to obtain control of a portion of the Network and begin to create their own stellar empire.
The fact that they did so—and still, in an off-and-on and unpredictable way, maintain a certain quasi-"alliance" with the Jao—underscores the bizarre nature of the Interdict creed. The Jao, after all, are also maintaining and even extending the Network. Yet the Interdict seems not to object.
One theory is that whatever scientific underpinnings originally lay beneath Interdict ideology have long since been lost. What has come to replace the notion that the Network itself threatens the universe is a more mystical notion that the Network is "unclean." The danger is spiritual, in other words, not physical.
One contradiction this situation presents is that in order to destroy the Network, the Interdict must use it themselves. Indeed, in many areas of the galaxy, it is they who are rebuilding the old framepoints and extending new ones. Apparently, Interdict adherents go through some sort of purification rite which allows them to do so. As always, the precise tenets of the Ekhat creed are at least murky if not quite unfathomable to non-Ekhat.
APPENDIX B:
Interstellar Travel
The method of supra-light travel used by all intelligent species is usually called, by the Jao, the "Frame Network." The method involves warping spacetime using extremely powerful generators positioned in at least three widely spaced locations in the stellar neighborhood. (Three will work, but is risky; four is better; five is ideal; more than five is redundant.) These "framepoints" must be at least three light years apart, but are not effective if the distance between any two extends much more than eleven light years.
Existing frame points allow ships to cross the stellar distances between them in what is effectively an instantaneous transition. There is theoretical debate over whether the transition is "really" instantaneous. But from the subjective standpoint of any human or other intelligent species, the travel is instantaneous. The dispute is whether or not it actually requires a few nanoseconds.
In essence, two framepoints working together are creating what can be called an artificial wormhole. New territory, where there does not exist a framepoint, can be reached in one of two ways. One way is to use sub-light exploratory ships. Once arrived at a suitable location for a new framepoint, the ship (or multiship expedition) can begin to create the new framepoint, which can then begin to participate in extending the entire Frame Network.
Of course, this method of extending the Frame is very slow. The other method is to use existing FP generators to create what is called a "Point Locus."
Triangulating (more often: quadri-angulating or quint-angulating) their power, these framepoint generators can create a temporary Point Locus at a distance. For a certain period of time, ships can travel to the Point Locus from any one of the FP generators which created it.
This is the normal method used for invasion fleets, since it is impossible to invade a framepoint held by an enemy. (They just "turn off" their end of the Network and the invaders vanish, no one knows exactly where.) Invaders from the outside can triangulate on an enemy solar system, create a point locus which is independent of the enemy's side of the Network, and send an invasion fleet that way.
The expense and risk involved is considerable, however. Point loci tend to be unstable over any extended period of time, so the window of opportunity for an invasion is limited. To use an historical analogy, each invasion is like a major amphibious assault during World War II. If a large enough beachhead is not secured quickly, the invasion will face disaster by being stranded and overrun. Moreover, because of the impossibility of matching loci in open space, the point locus must always be created within the photosphere of a star. In essence, the star itself serves the participating frame generators as a common target. But that obviously presents its own set of dangers.
How unstable and temporary a point locus proves to be, varies according to a wide range of factors. These include: the number of FP generators used, distance, and a multitude of more subtle factors involving a lot of specific features of the galactic neighborhood—dust cloud densities, nearby novas or neutron stars, etc. Creating a point locus is as much as art as a science, as well as being extremely expensive, and is never something to be undertaken lightly.
THE END
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Eric Flint, The Course of Empire
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