New Callisto

New Callisto is the third moon of Tau Ceti five. A human colony was established here in the ancient days before the Great Forgetting on Earth. A hybrid culture has emerged in which species native to the moon co-exist with gene adapted and evolved humans.

Geography

New Callisto is a moon of the gas giant Great Cetus which orbits Tau Ceti in a little less than one standard Earth year, somewhat closer than Earth to its somewhat cooler sun. The moon has a moderately thick and breathable atmosphere, the pressure being around eighty percent of that on Earth. It has a somewhat lower mass and gravity and an ocean that covers most of the surface which is also correspondingly smaller in area than Earth. The moon is not tidally locked. It orbits Great Cetus, in a period of a little more than twelve local days, each of which takes about twenty Earth standard hours. Because the orbit is slightly ecentric, there is a complex pattern of eclipses and New Callisto does not always go into the shadow of Great Cetus on every orbit. New Callisto is dotted with a number of large and small islands which were settled by humans in the distant past.

Ecosystem

The native ecosystem which was present on the moon before the first humans arrived consists mainly of lower growing plants and a few species of trees, with most complex animal life living in the extensive oceans. Humans have introduced new species and hybridised them with the natives over many generations. They themselves have become taller with larger lungs to better obtain oxygen from the thinner atmosphere.