Index Project



The Index Project was a Karnasaur research endeavor started in the year 5,397 BC by Emperor Sark Haek. Its purpose was dual in nature: To index all sentient life in the galaxy, and to experiment on said life to procure potentially useful biological material such as certain traits or adaptations.

Founding
The Project was initiated a few years after the creation of the First Iteration of the Galactic Senate by Emperor Sark to get a head start on the other Senate States in the inevitable race to chart the galaxy. Sark issued a Royal Proclamation to a Sauran scientist, Nekto Rus'tarr who was recommended by his Vizier of Knowledge, Serh Vesh, to become the first Project Director. The proclamation formally named Nekto as Project Director, and listed his initial budget to recruit and procure whatever he felt best for the Project according to the three priorities laid out in the proclamation. Nekto had his work cut out for him, as the Head of the Deparment of Knowledge, Sree Hasr, was assigned by Sark to work out everything Nekto requested, so long as he stayed within budget and did not request anything assigned elsewhere. With his 2,000,000 Nra budget, Nekto managed to procure a fleet of vessels and teams which would be enough to start the project. Sark wanted to get the job done, but he also wanted to make sure he wasn't wasting national budget on it; He wanted the entire Nidus Cluster and at least 33% of the Yetu Basin indexed completely within five years.

A monumental task before him, Nekto set out with the officially ordained 1st Indexing Fleet across the Nidus Cluster, sending one of 154 ships to a star system at any time. It would take a little less than a week to scan the whole system for potential life, and most were blissfully empty. However, once life was found, it would take a few hours to pick out any intelligent life, followed by weeks or even months of cataloging and experimentation in case any interesting traits were found.

Fortunately, Nekto's efficient planning, and the relative emptiness of the Sauran home cluster and it's neighbor, allowed the Indexing Fleet to complete its mission on time, and Sark issued a proper budget, rather than paying salaries: Nekto was given a strong 21,000,000 N to expand the Project and allow greater Indexing potential. The Project had gone from its infancy to its rapidly growing adolesence.

Monoliths
A trademark of the Project, Monoliths were devices left by Indexing Fleets to record and manage the evolution of any species deemed potentially important. Each Monolith would record as many details as possible, such as weather, biological activity, et cetera, to a central database. The database was managed by several AIs, who would monitor different areas of the galaxy. At a certain point, these AIs would release a signal to tell the Monolith of a world to release some form of technological information; If the species was deemed to have potential as soldiers, the Monolith would dispense mostly military technology, such as primitive blueprints for a spear or sword. If they were labelled to be diplomats, the Monolith would spark the dawn of their language and economic understanding. Each Monolith was different in form, but identical in function: While they were different for each race, none of them acted any different than the other. The reason for this was a fear that the KMF would be discovered in the future as being responsible for the evolution of one species, which, as was feared, might be culturally considered grounds for war.