The World of Tear

 

The world of Tear is not a planet - but rather a moon. It is one of six moons orbiting a planet known as Vehira. Vehira is a gas giant orbiting within the habitable zone of its star, Azane.

Azane & Vehira

Azane is a typical G-Type yellow dwarf star. It has a radius of about 700,000 kilometers, a gravity of about 270 m/s^2, and a surface temperature of about 5500 degrees Kelvin.

Orbiting Azane at a distance of about 150 million kilometers is Vehira. Vehira is a medium sized gas giant with a greyish-brown coloration. It has a radius of about 60,000 kilometers, and a gravity of about 25 m/s^2. Vehira is orbitted by six moons, the closest of which is known as Tear. Vehira has an orbital period around Azane of 399 Tear days.

Orbital Map

Vehiran Moons

Of the six moons that orbit Vehira, Tear is the closest and the second largest, with an orbital period of 24 hours. The other five moons orbiting Vehira are named for the gods of the people of Tear - with each moon bearing two names; one for the Sibling, and the other for the corresponding Versai, used to refer to the side of the moon that is in shadow at any given time.

Time

As with any planet or moon, Tear measures its year as the amount of time it takes to complete an orbit of Azane. As a tidally locked moon, its day is measured by how long it takes to complete an orbit of the planet Vehira, which is the same amount of time it takes to rotate once on its own axis.

Day & Night

Tear is tidally locked to Vehira, meaning that the same side of the moon always faces the planet. People on one side of the moon never see Vehira, and people on the other side see Vehira in a fixed position in the sky 24 hours a day. At the ‘sides’ of the planet are two regions where Vehira is always on the horizon. In the western hemisphere, Vehira obscures the setting sun making dusk come early, and in the eastern hemisphere it obscures the rising sun, making dawn come late.

On the side that faces Vehira it never gets truly dark, because when it is the middle of the night there, Vehira is facing the sun directly, reflecting a lot of light back down on Tear; that said, Vehira is a dusty greyish-brown swirl of gasses with a low overall albedo, so while it never gets truly dark, the lighting impact of Vehira, fully lit in the sky, is similar to predawn lighting - colors can be discerned, but only barely.

A day on tear is 24 hours long, and because the axial tilt is less than one degree, day and night are the same length everywhere on Tear, every day of the year. Sunrise is at 6am, and sunset is at 6pm. Twilight lasts about an hour before and after dusk and down, allowing for about 14 hours of workable day-time. On the side of Tear where Vehira is always visible, it is a little different.

Vehira covers an arc of about 20 degrees in the sky, meaning that when Vehira eclipses Azane, it lasts for about 80 minutes. In the eastern hemisphere, this is culturally incorporated as a ‘second dawn’; a morning break from the workday where a real breakfast is usually taken. In the western hemisphere, this usually manifests as a nap time in the afternoon.

Seasons

Tear has an axial tilt of less than one degree, meaning there is essentially no seasonal change in the day/night cycle, and the entire world experiences the same seasons at the same time. That said, Vehira orbits Azane at an unusually close proximity, giving it a fast, and very elliptical orbit - this somewhat eccentric orbit means that Vehira and her moons both experience seasonal temperature change due to variable proximity to the star. Additonally, mineral distribution across the world is uneven, and the continents exhibit strong climactic variance. While the majority of grains and vegetables are planted in spring and harvested in fall, there are many off-season crops, and many migrating animals that chase nutrients and thus fill the gaps to provide year-round food production.

Calendar

Vehira’s orbital period is 399 days - which coincidentally corresponds exactly to the orbital conjunction of the inner four moons. The year is divided into ten months of 40 days each, with one day in each year being skipped. The day that is chosen to be skipped each year is not consistent from year to year, or from place to place, and different regions, governments, or organizations will have different methods for determining which day is skipped - meaning the date can differ by a day from place to place.

Cultures on Tear have not adopted a concept of weeks, though in most cultures the 1st, 10th, 20th, 30th and 40th day of the month are frequently adopted as days of rest. The majority of holidays and feast days are moved to coincide with these days. The months are named for constellations in the night sky representing typical objects of seasonal importance.

Aside from their number, individual days on Tear are not named. A given day is simply ‘4 Bee’ or ’23 Trowel’.

Convention of Years and Dating

The recorded and prerecorded history of Tear is divided into four epochs, and dated by years using a convention that was established with the chartering of the First Council of Briunida, in the year that would come to be established around the world as the Year 0.

Prior to the Year 0, years are numbered backwards, and indicated with the designation BCB, which stands for Before the Chartering of Briunida. Thus, the First Epoch is the span of prehistory prior to 5000 BCB, the Second Epoch runs from 5000 BCB to 1700 BCB, the Third Epoch, in which Briunida was Chartered and the Briunidan Calendar first adopted, runs from 1700 BCB, through the Year 0, to the year 471. The Fourth Epoch starts in the year 471, and is still ongoing.