Q's Guide to the Continuum
Preface
The following document was compiled by Q, whom you may refer to as my stepmother (Though I assure you, I have a real mother). It details the nature of not only the Continuum, but also the 1,687 factions of the Q, and the threads that bind the multiverse. The years ago denoted throughout the document are based on the year they were written, which you would recognize as 2386, Earth standard.
Without having read this document several years ago, I might have been lost inside the Continuum. At that time, it was classified Top Secret and only available to members of Faction 1687. I now present it to you, my mortal friends, with only some minor editing (denoted by [brackets]) to help you keep the various entities, territories, and threads straight. Of course, even a mortal realizes that a Q is a Q is a Q. . .
Sincerely,
Shannara Rozhenko
Chapter One: Factions 1 through 16
In the beginning, [The One] traveled the threads for a millennium and one year. During this time, he defined the threads as a grid 196 sectors x 196 sectors and each sector as 1.7 x 10^8 kilometers. Every sector contained exactly one thousand, twelve threads. He discovered that a multiverse, not a universe existed, and that every verse was connected by a thread, but that most threads led to voids. He visited the few scattered verses in existence back then, nearly ten billion years ago, sometimes mingling with the natives by first altering his appearance to match theirs.
Then one day, [The One] realized he possessed the ability to manipulate matter. At first, he experimented by creating planets, then star systems, and finally a galaxy or two. He latched onto a thread leading to a void and making his bravest move yet, used his talent to form a verse of his own. This verse became known as the Continuum.
Q set up house inside his Continuum and enjoyed the peace and tranquility for a few centuries. He did not miss the people he had once referred to as his race, not even the members of his former family. They were long dead, and their descendants would only be frightened of a being such as himself. Now and then, he continued to manipulate matter to change his environment. Eventually, he grew bored and began looking back toward the threads and wondering whether there were any more intelligent lives out there. Since he had evolved into a superior being, surely others possessed the same potential.
He returned to the threads and began revisiting verses, this time in search of others like himself. Most species he encountered were non-sentient, and even among those who were sentient, finding one who was worthy of the Continuum among them was like hunting for a single grain of sand at a beach. Yet Q persisted and year by year, he found a few superior beings and brought those who were willing back to the Continuum. A village became a city, and a city became a state. Soon, the Continuum numbered a million, and [The One] was finally content with the Utopia he had built.
[The One] ruled the Continuum as a monarch with [the High Q] as his top advisor. The majority of the Q were so grateful to their leader that they never questioned his authority. For the most part, any opposition was minimal and immediately squelched by [The One's] enormous army. Thus, this monarchal government remained in power inside the Continuum for nearly two billion years with few challenges. Q were allowed to come and go as they pleased and create new verses at whim, provided they gave their allegiance solely to [The One].
Dissension occurred nearly seven billion years ago as the Continuum grew more and more populated. Some wanted an end to admitting new members into the Continuum. An easily fixed problem, [the High Q] advised, and seeing the wisdom of his top advisor, [The One] expanded the size of the Continuum by fifty percent. The verse known as the Continuum became defined as a spheroid with a diameter of roughly 2.3 x 10^48 kilometers. Although it was considerably smaller than many of the other verses, it provided adequate room for the creation of more superior beings. Unlike other verses, which consisted of stars, planetary bodies, and vast regions of space, the Continuum contained a single land mass with a surface area of 1.66 x 10^97 kilometers, broken up by a lake or river here and there. A road ran down the center of the Continuum, dividing it into two equal pieces. Some historians believe that The Road was Q's greatest mistake as it encouraged Q to take sides.
While the expansion of the Continuum seemed to solve the population problem, it also widened the berth of the domain [The One] and his army needed to control. Soon, the opposition grew in numbers and in strength and formed an army of their own. They began holding secret meetings on the opposite side of the verse from where [The One] resided in his castle. [Gates], who led these meetings, wanted to see all entrances for new Q shut down immediately. He did not want to take over [The One's] kingdom, nor did he want to destroy it. He merely wanted to limit the population of the Continuum before it became overcrowded. One Q per every 1.1 x10^90 kilometers was reasonable, since intelligent beings needed the space to experiment, to manipulate, and basically to play to their heart's content.
[Gates] claimed a portion of the Continuum for his own and Faction 2 [Iron Gates] was formed 6,995,996,465 years ago. His castle was vastly different from [The One's] with not only twice the square footage, but also surrounded by a twenty-foot wall with an iron gate only at the front end of the property. Many questioned the logic of such a fortress when any Q could flash inside the territory with a mere thought. Yet the gate, and the guards behind it, remained a deterrent to other Q.
[Gates] spoke of shutting down the Gate of Origin, a powerful devise that allowed beings, who had the potential to evolve into Q, passage into the Continuum. He spoke of disallowing the transfer of the power of the Q to any new entities. Less was more, he argued. The Q needed to consider how continuing to offer the power of the Q would weaken them. His words were heard by many listening ears. Within a century, Faction 2 was a thriving group.
Since the members of the new faction kept their distance from [The One's] kingdom, he chose to ignore them and continue on with his own business. The mass majority of Q still held an allegiance to him. The Gate of Origin was still operating, and Q regularly brought new recruits into his flock. [Gates] and his minion talked a good talk, but they showed little action.
He would soon regret this decision as the successful split of Faction 2 encouraged others to step forward and voice their opinions. Some began shouting that not only should the entrances to new Q be closed, but that some already admitted members should be banned from the Continuum. Not all Q were created equal and those lesser than themselves did not deserve to possess the Power of the Q. Thus, roughly 6,995,993,569 years ago, Faction 3 [The Mafia] formed and set up house near the center of the Continuum. The Road lies prominently outside the doors of their casino. Although The Road was well traveled, most Q flashed past the casino to avoid [Poppa] and his family of Q.
Over the next several centuries, the population inside the Continuum decreased dramatically from an estimated twenty million to a little over seventeen million. Some were banned by Faction 3; others were executed by them. The Gate of Origin was shut down by [Poppa]. Immediately, [The One] demanded that it be reopened. The Q should continue to allow budding superior entities a way inside the Continuum, he bellowed. This was his kingdom and he set the rules! Yet when he sent his army out to reactivate the Gate of Origin, it was nowhere to be found. This event sparked a war with Faction 2 joining Faction 3 against Faction 1. Many more deaths occurred, but [The One] was reluctant to carry out any executions. He wanted the Continuum to be a thriving verse, not one of death and decay. After nearly a million years, [The One] admitted defeat and gave up the search for the Gate of Origin. This war became known as the Tri-Q War. The estimated population of the Continuum at the end of the war was thirteen million. To this day, the present location of the Gate of Origin is unknown. [At the time this document was written]
A few members of Faction 1 began worrying about the stability of the multiverse. They argued that the threads were not impervious to corruption and pleaded with [The One] and his high counsel to impose laws to protect the balance between verses. [The One] insisted that he must not restrict Q's liberty to create verses at whim, nor their privilege of traveling across the multiverse. With indignance, the recalcitrant Q pulled away from [The One's] kingdom and formed Faction 4 [Equilibrium] about 6,991,452,023 years ago. They reside to this day barely more than ten thousand kilometers from Faction 1's territory. Many argue, with substantial evidence, that Faction 4 never really wanted to break from Faction 1. They had hoped to win him and the [High Q] over with their elegant speeches.
The next split occurred within the [Iron Gates]. Some members of Faction 2 believed that measures should be taken to conceal knowledge of the Continuum from all other verses. [Gates] insisted that as long as other verses were denied access to the Continuum, then who cared if they were aware of its existence? This argument went on for more than a million years at which time the dissident Q wandered away from [Gates] playground and formed Faction 5 [Shielded Guard] 6,978,556,503 years ago. The [Shielded Guard] set up a similar fortress 1.2 million kilometers west of Faction 2. Outside the fortress, Q rotate a guards post with one hundred members in position, muskets ready, at any one time.
Another subgroup of Faction 1 came forward accusing [The One], the [High Q] and the High Counsel of not working diligently enough to maintain the integrity of the Continuum. [The One] and the [High Q] had both grown lax with their responsibilities. Since the end of the Tri-Q war, they had done little recruiting to fortify their army. What if Faction 2 or 3 attacked again? Faction 1 was not prepared for the eventuality of another war. If [they] did not value a unified Continuum then what did one more splintering matter? Thus this subgroup of nearly twenty-four thousand became the [Bloodlines] of Faction 6 some 6,975,437,284 years ago. Their leader, [General] trained all of them to be soldiers in his army.
Roughly 6,970,111,459 years ago, a splinter group branched from Faction 3. This group of [Destroyers] wanted to see the annihilation of all other verses. By this time, Q-created verses had cut the number of voids in half. Over a period of roughly eight and a half million years, the [Destroyers] succeeded at eliminating a few thousand verses. Worried that Faction 7 would soon tear the multiverse apart, Factions 1 and 4 formed a loose alliance 6,981,603,709 years ago in a joint effort to defeat the [Destroyers]. This became known as the Destroy or Be Destroyed War and lasted a little over five millennia. At the war's end, all known members of the [Destroyers] had been killed. Faction 7 became the first extinct faction.
The next faction, [Judges] also branched from Faction 3. This small group of Q believed that the bad seeds should be judiciously culled out from the Continuum. This, they said, was the only way to discover those few worthy of the Continuum. [The One] accused them of wanting the Continuum for themselves and would have nothing further to do with them. Given his reaction, some were surprised that he didn't ban the [Judges], but [The One] remained steadfast in his belief that once a Q, always a Q. [Poppa], on the other hand, begged the [Judges] not to splinter from his group. Since they were the second group to leave his loving arms, he feared the imminent extinction of Faction 3. This fear was ungrounded, since the [Mafia] was still a thriving faction with nearly seventy-five thousand members.
Only a few millennia before the advent of the Destroy or Be Destroyed War, about 6,961,639,367 years ago, about forty-eight thousand members of Faction 7 broke from the group, both in fear of their lives and in direct opposition to their former leader. They argued that it was not necessary to destroy entire verses to maintain the balance of the multiverse. They only needed to cull out the non-sentient scum from each verse. Although their actions were not approved by either Factions 1 or 4, they were not targeted during the war. Today, after several more faction splits, they remain an enduring faction of a little over six thousand. Their culling activities have dropped considerably as they fear following the path of Faction 7.
A rather small group of Q branched from Faction 9 roughly 6,955,190,492 years ago. These [Rat Boys] of Faction 10 accused Faction 9 of being too hasty about terminating other species. The [Rat Boys] frequently visited other verses, kidnaping unsuspecting mortals to run numerous experiments on them. Many of the experiments involved one type of torture or another. The [Rat Boys] justified their torture treatments by insisting the tests would one day provide the answer as to why Q evolved. Today, the [Rat Boys] are an endangered group. Many of them have been banned or executed by the [Mafia], but the remaining members have managed to survive by stealth.
Another small group emerged 6,944,297,293 years ago, branching from Faction 6. These [Angels] of Faction 11 spend their days dwelling on the possible extinction of all life inside the Continuum. They strive diligently to end all banishments and executions. For a while [The One] listened to their pleas, allowing them to hold rallies and declare their pledges of "life, not death." Faction 11 had formed during a period of great expansion inside the Continuum, with the population increasing to an estimated twenty-two million, greater than the numbers seen before the Tri-Q war. Thus [The One] and others began to turn a deaf ear to them. Unfortunately, the [Angels] have become the targets of Factions such as 3, 9, and 17, and their numbers have steadily dwindled over the millennia. They may soon face their own extinction.
Around the same time that the [Angels] were forming, a small sub-group of the [Shielded Guard] demanded that they take their philosophy one step further. Too many mortals were already aware of the Continuum's existence. If they systematically used mind control, then all mortals could be made to forget about the Continuum and the Q could live in secret. The leader of Faction 5, [Armor] argued that the number of mortals aware of the Continuum's existence was minuscule and that a wide-swept mind control was a waste of their time. The sub-group broke from Faction 5 nearly 6,942,925,002 years ago and formed Faction 12, [Operation Mind Sweep]. Immediately, they began constructing a mind-sweep device that could wipe any undesired memory from any free-thinking being in the multiverse! They caused their own extinction 6,942,923,117 years ago when this mind sweep device malfunctioned and incinerated them.
Although all the members of Faction 6 agreed that they needed to work diligently to maintain a strong Continuum, differences of opinion arose on how to reach that goal. One large subgroup believed that all beings entering the Continuum for the first time should undergo an intensive interrogation before being granted passage. They finalized their long list of questions 6,925,362,206 years ago and formed Faction 13. While the other members of Faction 6 were saddened by the parting, they did not attempt to change their minds. These [Interviewers] are a thriving group today. They usually appear before new Q in groups of threes to ask a series of questions to the unsuspecting newbie. At the conclusion of the interview, most new Q are placed on probation by the [Interviewers], an activity sanctioned by [The One].
About 6,921,587,234 years ago, a split occurred inside Faction 2. Although the reason for this split has perplexed many Q historians, it was obviously irrevokable. The members of Faction 14, [Folie a Melee], share a delusion so complex that most other Q are unable to fully understand it. Even those Q who belong to factions that branched from Faction 14, once distanced from Faction 14, grew befuddled by both the philosophy and the actions of Faction 14. [Folie a Melee] is an elite group and has rarely accepted new members since their formation. They reside on the southeastern corner of the Continuum in a city they call Quiver. Other Q have often been targeted by Faction 14 and it is believed, though none have been proven, that they are responsible for countless executions.
Faction 15 [Monitors] branched from Faction 3 about 6,916,761,201 years ago when a few members of the [Mafia] began questioning whether or not they should destroy any more verses. They concluded that it was better to closely monitor the remaining verses and to make contact with Q-created species when necessary. By monitoring the multiverse from pivotal locations inside the threads, they were able to analyze the mass number of verses and make recommendations. Rarely have the [Monitors] recommended extinguishing a verse, but often, they have suggested radical alterations to verses they believed might pose a threat to the Continuum.
The last faction to ever branch from Faction 1 came 6,909,303,211 years ago. Faction 16, the [Non-Corporeal], grew tired of their existence inside the Continuum. Although they did not voice any specific gripes against [The One] or his kingdom, they admitted they were discontent with the stagnation of the Continuum. Today, the [Non-Corporeal] exist in a plane halfway between the threads and the verses. So rarely does one of them, and never all of them at once, return briefly to a corporeal state that their exact population has never been tabulated. Little is known about the philosophy of these elusive Q.
Although the unified kingdom once numbered nearly twenty million, after five direct splits from Faction 1, the portion of the kingdom still under [The One's] control remained a thriving entity. Then one day, [The One] grew ill, so ill in fact, that [The High Q] became the acting leader of Faction 1. His job, above all else, was to prevent others from learning [The One] was ill. They were now harboring possibly the greatest secret in all the multiverse – Q were not immortal!