Spine of Worlds

The Spine of Worlds is the name given to the supermassive black hole at the center of The Skylands Galaxy. It is around 200,000,000 standard galactic masses giving it a Schwarzchild radius of 600,000,000 km. Its accretion disc extends out by 3.85 light-hours from the singularity, and is an interstellar recognised no-fly zone. The Spine itself is used as a standard reference point by many galactic portelans and is the primary measure around which the galaxy is divided up into its various sectors. Many Jethro era derelicts and ruins have been found in proximity to the Spine, and it is thought that many more may have been lost into the hole itself.

Hans' candle is a star in a highly elliptical orbit around the spine. It is notable for the large fluctuations it gives in apparent magnitude due to doppler brightening. At the perigee of its orbit, this effect is at its greatest, giving a bright 'flash' visible from the Lagranjo-4 observatory, very close to the Kipla zero. With a period of 31.1 million seconds, these flashes mark the beginning of a new Galactic Tick, and make a useful, universal timestamp.