Hostages of The Ultralum - Settings

Settings

• A luxury hotel on an unnamed yellow and orange coloured planet where Valérian and Laureline are spending their vacation. They have also been brought on excursions to:
  • Kokok'Um. To see the underwater colonnades.
  • Tak. To see the crystalloid formations which remind Laureline of the asteroid belt surrounding Alflolol.
  • An unnamed planet to watch the primitive wildlife.
• Point Central, the vast space station where all the races of the cosmos meet, previously seen in Ambassador of the Shadows and On the Frontiers. Point Central is made up of many different segments:
  • Earth's segment, ruined and crumbling just like it was in On the Frontiers. Its sole occupant remains Jal.
  • A service astroport on the dark side of Point Central used by several races. It is from here that the Mortis Quartet transfer their prisoners to the stellar barge that takes them to Iksaladam.
  • The Caliph addresses the assembled dignitaries in the vast Hall of Screens, the meeting place for Point Central's council.
  • Laureline's Tchoung-tracer passes through several segments of Point Central previously seen in Ambassador of the Shadows and On the Frontiers while searching for Valérian:
    • The endless corridors and passageways that connect the segments maintained by the mute Zools.
    • The Groubos and their Zuur pilots.
    • The warlike Kamuniks.
    • The Marmakas.
    • The Pulpissim's market.
• Iksaladam, the area of the cosmos richest in the valuable Ultralum fuel needed to power the spatio-temporal engines of most races' spaceships. The high concentration of Ultralum causes frequent distortions in the local fabric of space-time and, as a result, the entire region is a shambles of planets, asteroids, comets, debris and dust. The only people capable of navigating it are the old space dogs that carry the Ultralum fuel in their barges and the Caliph's navy who have highly sophisticated tracking and detection equipment. Iksaladam is ruled by its Caliph, descended from the prophet, one of the richest men in the cosmos, who rules from his vast palace on the central planet in the Iksaladam system. The Ultralum is mined by the Extralums (short for Extractors of Ultralum) who use mobile extraction wells which are capable of adapting to the spatio-temporal instability of the region. Nevertheless, Ultralum mining is highly hazardous and accidents are very common.