Ryen Kya, aka
(named, like quite a lot of girls from that time period, after a certain water goddess who was the subject of a very popular TV show at the time), was hatched in Y943, she and her other half Ayen are the older pair of Ryen-pack's children. Ryen-pack lives in a fancy apartment on the shores of the oasis in the predominantly upper middle class District 2, not far from the huge skyscrapers of Ikun's Financial District, District 1, where they work for an influencing firm; basically they get hired by wealthy clients to get the Lawspeakers to change laws for them. In Y952, Ryen-pack gets a new assignment to help a foreign billionaire pack from the Meatbucket region (Andin city-state in specific), Dagwar-pack, to get Ikun to remove their regulations around geoengineering and other green tech like ecological nanobots. Dagwar-pack seem to be very eccentric to say the least, but have built up an eco-tech empire in the Meatbucket and are looking to expand to the Ikun market. However, since Ikun has banned this and heavily pressures city-states around the world to do the same using its considerable soft power, this is because any global Climate Control System that arises from widespread geoengineering would likely be heavily controlled by their geopolitical enemy Koranah, who is ahead of Ikun in this industry. This is of course not told to the public; the official narrative is that geoengineering is dangerous and unreliable, and the environment is collapsing so fast that only extreme measures like leaving the planet via Project Hope are viable. This quickly becomes a passion project for Ryen-pack, their alpha Kerok in particular, whose birth-pack were climate scientists. Ryen-pack sees this as an opportunity to do a lot of good, as they believe that with Project Hope, society is hurtling towards collapse and Project Hope is accelerating their demise. They spend long hours working on the project, staying at the office far into the night and coming in on weekends. The young Kya and Ayen aren't neglegted, the adults still spend time with them and teach them a lot about their fields of expertise (as they all are highly educated, having gone to the world-famous Nktan University). However, they still spend a lot of time in the office while their birth-pack makes calls and writes reports, instead of being out playing or exploring or doing whatever young Kyanah normally do...well young Kyanah from middle class packs anyway. Even the pack's vacations are heavily geared towards work, they often travel to far flung city-states to gather environmental data or speak with local politicians, scientists, and business owners.
As the years go by, Ryen-pack starts to put together a picture of what's going on, and how geoengineering and related technologies are not as dangerous as Ikun's politicians claim, and that the environment, while bad, is not collapsing fast enough to justify the stated motives for Project Hope. However, this isn't enough for Ikun's Lawspeakers to put a stop to Hope, or really do much of anything, and the project keeps rolling onward. Kya and Ayen remain very close to each other, at one point making each other these bracelet thingies and promising to wear them even when they had their own packs. However, Ayen is clearly much more academically inclined and more interested in activism for Ryen-pack's mission, whereas Kya of a normal kid (as far as Kyanah go...) who is growing up to be more outdoorsy and also a bit of a geek--she kind of admires Project Hope on the down low. Their second pair of young, Nyak and Korek, hatch in Y954, with considerable complications for Teren, who laid their eggs; this is about the only thing that temporarily distracts the pack from their work.
By Y960, Ryen-pack's boss decides to drop Dagwar-pack as a client and move on to less controversial clients with a better chance of winning. However, Ryen-pack, at Kerok's behest calls in a lot of favors and takes on a lot of extra work from their boss in exchange for being able to keep Dagwar-pack as a client. This means that the pack is even more consumed with work. However, it is all for naught, and by Y962, their boss announces that the company is officially dropping the Dagwar-pack work and they can no longer cover for Ryen-pack. Nua, who is a late import to Ryen-pack and one of the more impulsive members, blurts out that they are going to get into politics to do it themselves. Kerok actually thinks this is a good idea, and Ryen-pack quits to pursue a challenge for Lawspeaker. Though naturally, leaving their job doesn't mean less work for them. They hire a pack of analysts and staffers to work out an optimal strategy--which isn't cheap even for Ryen-pack--and begin promoting themselves in Ikun and beyond. Their campaign strategy is highly optimized and data driven, with very specific words and actions called for from all of the pack. This includes their young--while Nyak and Korek are young enough that they can be sedated for high profile events without drawing too much negative attention, Kya and Ayen are expected to actively participate and play their complex roles in showcasing Ryen-pack as a viable Lawspeaker. Ayen takes much better to this than Kya, she studies their pack's strategy more and deeper and plays the role of a firey young activist whose greatest fear is growing up in a dying world. Whereas Kya is clearly less comfortable in dealing with crowds, conforming to AI optimized scripts, and putting more energy and time into politics than she has to.
Slowly but surely, Ryen-pack begins to spend more time with Ayen than Kya, as Ayen is subconsciously seen as a more valuable resource for their political aims. Though everyone is on the surface still kind and loving, it's difficult to actual spend time with or get significant emotional energy from the adults, even Nua, whom Kya was very close to before Ryen-pack went into politics. Teren has probably changed the least, but has always been kind of reserved. In Y963, Ryen-pack files their first challenge for Lawspeaker against District 2's incumbent pack, but the challenge fails. Ryen-pack decides to regroup and focus less on obscure geoengineering policies and go straight for an attack on Project Hope. They realize it doesn't matter if geoengineering is a more sustainable solution than Project Hope--the elites know this already and have other considerations, and the regular citizens will never believe it due to years of propaganda. Kerok in particular is highly disappointed in their failure and insists that everyone needs to work harder and even more aggressively optimize their public behavior.
Y963 becomes Y964 and Ryen-pack goes for a Lawspeaker position again. This time they challenge the Lawspeakers Association itself with the goal of creating a new seat for themselves, and they focus on the economic and environmental effects of Project Hope itself, rather than going for a geoengineering platform directly. They actually win their challenge this time and become Lawspeakers for Ikun. Now they're in a position to kill Project Hope by removing it from the city's annual agenda, but getting there will be a difficult process. They first have to identify potential allies, built up their reputation, and identify possible threats to their soft power through extensive research on the other Lawspeakers. And of course the other Lawspeakers and their staffers are busy sizing them up as well. Ayen adapts well to this, though her zealousness and youthful lack of nuance sometimes come back to bite Ryen-pack and drive away possible allies. But Kya remains a fish out of water in the Hall of Power, especially with all the adults being pre-occupied and less supportive. Kerok often expresses disappointment when she fails to adhere to their carefully crafted strategies. Kaun does try to tell Kerok to go easier on Kya, but Kerok often doesn't listen to her and insists that the work they're doing is too important for any mistakes. Kaun still goes out of her way to try and mold her into a skilled political activist like Ayen, or at least an academic, much to Kya's dismay, and Teren, who is easily the least political of the adults, provides occasional respite for Kya, as does spending time with the boys, which she tries to do a lot while the rest of the pack is caught up in their political scheming and strategizing.
As Kya and Ayen reach their teenage years and the associated dominance struggles, they naturally drift apart, becoming more distant. This is exacerbated by the way in which the adults have played favorites and pitted them against each other to encourage the best possible "results" out of both of them. Ayen has developed a bit of an arrogant streak from years of being the golden child, and Kya has become somewhat agressive and resentful towards her as well, though they have their moments when they get along. Through Y965 and Y966, the pack begins to find their footing in the Lawspeakers Association and begins slowly but surely gathering together a bloc of politicians willing to work to stop Project Hope, for various reasons of their own, from seeing it as a waste of money to genuine concern about the environment to having money in the geoengineering sector to being neutral but willing to work on anti-Hope initiatives in exchange for other concessions. This also makes them enemies though, as there are many packs with deep pockets and a vested interest in continuing Project Hope, including Nyektak-pack themselves. A common strategy in Ikun's political culture (and really the planet's political culture as a whole) is to aggressively target the children of one's political enemies with constant harassment and slander to provoke their packs into withdrawing from politics to protect them. As their enemeies' analysts have deduced that Kya is the weak link, she bears the brunt of this. However, Ryen-pack refuses to fall for such tricks even though it's clearly hurting their children.
Meanwhile, Ryen-pack have to make many difficult decisions as a Lawspeaker, often about things that have no direct relation to Project Hope. In order to make allies and raise funding, they find themselves having to increasingly do shady back-room deals with huge corporations and foreign governments, and find themselves sacrificing many key positions and values to keep their position and influence among the Lawspeakers, which often causes disagreements among the adults. They end up lying, cheating, suppressing the economy, and more, but justify this under the assumption that they need to keep their power and influence to have a chance of stopping Project Hope. In the midst of navigating the shady world of Ikun politics, Ryen-pack is also often flying around the world to fancy climate conferences and leveraging their professional contacts and AI matching to arrange future packs for Kya and Ayen. For Ayen, they gradually find the perfect blend of scientific and activist minds from influential packs to place her with, which she seems very happy and excited about. However, Kya definitely does not want their help or involvement in selecting a pack for her, which complicates things further and puts her under even more pressure, and she spirals down a destructive path of self harming culminating in early Y967 with consuming a bottle of Teren's sleeping pills to try and end things after a huge fight with Ayen in which Kerok predictably took Ayen's side. However, she's discovered by Ayen and hospitalized before they can take full effect. However, Ryen-pack, and especially Kerok, have by this point become so consumed by their political ambitions that they rapidly carry on with what they were doing, even having an important meeting as soon Kya physically recovers enough for the pack to leave the hospital. However, Ayen gives Kya a heartfealt apology and they make up somewhat.
The next couple of years go by quickly, as Ryen-pack begins to consider the possibility of challenging Nyektak-pack for City Alpha eventually. The economy continues to freefall but Ryen-pack is well-to-do enough to avoid the worst of it. Efforts to get Kya a pack resume to some extent, but don't really get anywhere. And Kya continues to deal with lingering depression due to both the stresses of political life and her belief that the planet is quickly dying and her pack is working to dismantle what she thinks is the best chance of saving their species. She becomes outright supportive of Project Hope, even to the point of having some pro-Hope merch, but for obvious reasons has to keep this secret from the rest of her pack. In Y969, she and Ayen both sit the entrance exams for Nktan University, as this is seen as a critical next step in the initiative to stop Project Hope and save the planet (though Kya, for her part, actually wants to be a scientist or engineer on Project Hope so she can get herself and her future pack off the planet). Located in the neighboring city-state of Nktan, Nktan University, the most prestigious university in the world and Ryen-pack's alma mater. Ayen receives an invitation (Nktan University is so prestigious that you don't apply, you have to get invited to attend) as do all the prospective packmates picked out for her, but as it turns out, Kya is not invited and is inconsolable, as without this, getting onto Project Hope is much more difficult. Kerok and Kaun reassure her that they will find her some bright and loving young minds for a pack and get her into one of Ikun's local public universities, and make sure that she and her pack will make great activists and be a huge help for Ryen-pack's goals regardless. Obviously, this is not really what Kya wants to hear. She makes up her mind that even if she can't get off the planet as a scientist, she can still get off the planet as a soldier, and resolves to join Ikun's military, not just to escape a "dying world" but also to spite her birth-pack. She knows that her pack will never approve of this, and really wants the 100,000 qoin (converting alien currencies is hard, but this is likely about $20k USD) she and Ayen were each promised in order to get their lives started once they separate from Ryen-pack, so she lies that she has signed up for an environmentalist NGO and will travel for a few years and find a pack for herself that way. Kaun is a bit skeptical, but Nua thinks it's a brilliant idea, and he eventually convinces Kerok, who convinces the the rest of the pack to sign off on Kya's separation papers as well as Ayen's. Kya regrets not being around to shield Nyak and Korek from the toxic world of politics anymore, but she's made up her mind.
Kya and Ayen both leave together in Y970, Ayen to join her new pack and start at Nktan University, and Kya to join the Ikun Army. Ayen reveals that she knows Kya is lying about joining the NGO and asks what she's really doing. Kya decides to be honest and unload everything she's been keeping in all these years. Ayen is outraged at this and accuses Kya of never having loved Ryen-pack, seeing as she's willing to work against everything they stand for, which really touches a nerve for Kya. The two briefly fight physically before Ayen disengages and tosses her bracelet into the lake; the two then part ways on hostile terms.
from an old northwestern word for a messenger, is a few years older than Kya and Tau, having hatched in Y936. Aktektan-pack lives in a drab rundown apartment in Ikun's dirt-poor District 12 and works at a weapons factory owned by Ikoin Corporation assembling bombs and missiles for Ikun's military. Around Y950, production quotas at their factory are ramped up, as news reports show that in the south, Koranah is ramping up their own military and becoming increasingly bellicose, staging coups in several small pro-Ikun city-states and committing genocide (or so the TV says at least). Ikun is planning to send more troops and weapons to the region. Aktektan-pack is wildly supportive of this, even though it means higher quotas for them. They also seem to be constantly fighting with each other, and ignoring/isolating from each other over trivial issues; for instance they often leave Ractor by himself for hours at a time (not normal Kyanah behavior at all and seen as rather abusive in their society). However, Ractor the increased milatarism only benefits the military industrial complex and Ikun politicians, a view which he frequently and snarkily espouses even though it inevitably leads to shouting, name-calling, and violence. Karien, who laid Ractor's egg, tries to shelter him from the worst of it, but is mostly ineffectual. She also teaches Ractor to swim, a very rare ability among Kyanah, who are slightly denser than water.
, which actually doesn't mean anything, Ikun's immigration authorities just changed his actual name to sound more "Ikun-ish") hatched in Y944 to Rtoryn-pack, along with his other half Troyt. Rtoryn-pack is not originally from Ikun, but instead comes from the Duneland city of Adronkin and immigrated to Ikun in Y950. They have been apparently waiting for a long time (a couple of years at least) to be approved for an interview and in the meantime, their home city-state has been dealing with their oasis drying out leading to a coup attempt and civil war looming on the horizon. One of the pack's adults, Nekyez, suggests that their application will never move forward and they should try to sneak or bribe their way into Ikun, or find a different city state. However, this is likely not possible, as Ikun's borders are guarded by natural terrain, heavily armed border police, and a "virtual wall" of cameras, drones, and robots; many packs have been shot trying to sneak into Ikun. Rtoryn-pack's alpha Rytor insists that Ikun is a land of opportunity but they must make it their honestly to avoid giving their people a bad name. At long last, the pack is informed that they have been invited to challenge the Ikun government for entry into the city. A young Kwert asks what's in Ikun, to which Alpha Rytor simply says "hope" (ironic considering a certain megaproject going on in Ikun).