| abstract | - The Orion Indian Summer was a period of Orion history. It was a brief age of renewal for Orion culture and civilization amidst its decline. This is named for an Indian summer, a period of temporary summer-like weather during autumn. After the Orion Registry helped end the turbulent Reverse and slow the contraction of the Orion Colonies, it recorded the shrinking Orion population as stabilizing at 20.315 billion on 213 worlds in 1715 CE (reference stardate −3/15) and finally halting. This heralded almost a century of cultural rebirth for the Orion people (FASA RPG module: The Orions: Book of Common Knowledge). It also saw renewed interest in colonization, in returning to lost and abandoned Colonies. Even Grey Orions, stripped of their property and power and reduced to a slave-race during the Dispossession, regained some usefulness as they were employed to restore the stagnant Orion technology. Under their Ruddy Orion masters' control, they began to spread through the Colonies once more. However, as with the New Days, the Orion Indian Summer came to end in horror and bloodshed. Fearing the Greys again, the Ruddy masters spent over 150 years trying various methods of maintaining control, to keep them powerless but still useful. They decided upon genetic mutilations that made them utterly dependent on their owners and only marginally less useful. It was permanent, incurable and cheap. To prevent the Greys from ever undoing the damage, a great deal of Orion medical knowledge was purged, leaving Orion medicine behind that of other races, and resulting in additional suffering for other Orions. (FASA RPG module: The Orions: Book of Deep Knowledge) As Orion space had contracted in the Reverse, pirate numbers had increased, and the loss of order and trade had made them bold and desperate. The Registry had been equally valuable to them, as it showed prime targets to strike and places to avoid. Larger bands formed, growing to the size of pirate fleets, and instead of lone ships, they began to raid entire Orion Colonies. The puny Colony defense forces could not guard every world. This culminated in the devastating sacking of the Tellun system, led by the notorious Orion pirate Half-a-Man Sooris, beginning on 19th February, 1894 CE (stardate −2/9402.19). The Orion Colony on Troyius, once one of their most productive worlds, was temporarily abandoned, and over 2.5 million people died, including 1.5 million Orions. Even after the pirates withdrew, the fear remained and the decline of Orion space resumed. (FASA RPG module: The Orions: Book of Common Knowledge)
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