EVE General Discussion

So I read "Templar One" today, and it adds immensely to what I already knew about the Jovians, sleepers, Enheduanni, immortal soldiers, and the poor lil' empress, Jamyl Saurum. Seriously, read the book.

I have information about the Jovians from a few sources:
-"Theodocy"
-"Templar One"
-"Jove"
-And in-game resources (items, ships, characters, region descriptions)

I have a lot to say about the Jovians: pay attention, guys!!

The only race to survive the collapse of the eve gate, tech-wise, were the "Architects". They were, at the time, the least advanced race, strangely enough. They were forced to place themselves in cryo-stasis to survive, as their ships lacked the fuel necessary to power their "primitive" warp-drives, and they were many decades away from their destination, the Heaven Constellation. Whilst they slept, they were in a virtual reality where they could could continue to develop the system, and they continuously became more and more skilled in virtual reality.

The crews of the ships, designated as protectors of their entire culture and race during the migration, were called the "Enheduanni". They guarded the race as they settled in their new home and advanced. After a the collapse of the first empire, which we are told nothing about, the "Jovians" as we know them separated from the architects, who became more and more involved in cryostasis and their virtual "Utopia", where dilation of time and infinite resources within the system allowed them to advance at an impossibly rapid rate. They changed from being an elite subculture to one of the most powerful and influential forces of their civilization. At this time, the Enheduanni began to act as the highest powers in the empire, "gods" of a sort, dictating which technologies the Jovians were given.

The Enheduanni began, after the architects continued to advance farther and farther past the Jovians, to try to try to guide their world closer to the virtual one. They dictated the Jovians, and influenced them heavily, supporting those whom they liked and sabotaging whatever they didn't. The Jovians tolerated them for a long time, but everything changed when the "Jovian Disease" emerged.

The disease was believed to be able to be cured through the power of the architects, whom, even while they were almost certainly able to, said that they could not help. At this time, they began their exodus from Heaven, and stopped aiding the Jovians altogether, leading to the idea that they themselves had created the disease in order to force them into complying with their vision.

After leaving, but still being followed by the Jovians, the architects made sure that they'd NEVER be able to find them; they left into what we call "Anoikis" and sealed their way behind them.

These Jovians became what we call the "Sleepers", living in their virtual paradise while their drones guard their structures.

At the same time, the Enheduanni shifted their focus to influencing the developing people of new Eden. They allegedly have influenced the flow of history repeatedly, and may be the reason behind many of the empires' technological advances.

They were directly responsible for the battle of Vak'atioth, having influenced the Amarr empire, the Minmatar, and even a member of the Gallente republic, named Viola, causing extreme tensions leading to the Amarr attack on the Jovians, which failed, and the rebellion of the Minmatar following the defeat. The Jovians cut themselves off from the rest of the cluster as a direct consequence to this, to keep themselves from being dragged into the plans of the Enheduanni.

The next intervention was the most important event they caused: the "Other", the voice and force inside the mind of Empress Jamyl Saurum, to enter new Eden and enter her. The "Other" was a being, the first of it's kind, born within the virtual construct of the architects, that was not a creature of flesh and blood; it was a virtual being that came into existence on it's own.

The Enheduanni were actually considering whether or not to let it live when more beings like it began so appear. They were aware that their world was artificial, and this caused huge problems within the construct. The Enheduanni took it upon themselves to ease the architects in and out of their world in the best way for them, to avoid harm. Their actual overall goal is to lead all of humanity towards their virtual Utopia, but the Other is strictly at odds with them.

It rejects the mandates of the Enheduanni and acts on it's own. The destruction of sleepers by the empires was actually helping to play into it's hands: this allowed it to escape in the first place. It entered the mind of Jamyl after her clone was activated following her "death", and has tried to control her as much as possible since then.

The Enheduanni, who I thought were BAD, have actually been infiltrated and compromised by the other. It is obsessed with keeping humanity from reaching the envisioned utopia, and it is out to destroy all of it: it's first victims were the architects themselves, and aims for the entirety of the human race next. It aimed to get to them through the immortal soldiers, who originally were created directly from sleeper implants, making them slaves to the "other".

The Empress was actually able to be alerted to this by one of the men who was most into the sleeper technology and study, as well as their application. He warned her, as he, as well as many others, were secretly connected to her through the implants; she was then attacked by the other, but managed to get the order out to destroy the prototypes, despite the impossible pain the other caused her. Afterwards, it repressed the memory of the entire event, and keeps her from being able to do much of anything against it.

I read this while on holiday and really enjoyed it, looking forward to more books from Tony.