Hapes Cluster

The Hapes Cluster was a grouping of several hundred stars within the area of nebulous gases known as the Transitory Mists within the Inner Rim&mdash;an impediment to hyperspace navigation that had kept the stars of the cluster isolated from the rest of the Galaxy from before 3,000 BBY. This region's high density of stars, nebulae and moons bathed its worlds&mdash;particularly Hapes itself&mdash;in bright light, which, over the centuries, caused the Hapans to lose most of their night vision.

History
The Hapes Cluster was colonized around 4000 BBY by a band of pirates, known as the Lorell Raiders, who had found safe routes through the Transitory Mists to hide from Galactic Republic forces. Because the Lorell Raiders would abduct beautiful women along with their plunders, they would take them back to Hapes and eventually, due to the isolated gene pool, give rise to the near-Human Hapans. When the Jedi finally wiped out the Lorell Raiders, leaving the male population practically nonexistent, Hapes became a matriarchal monarchy led by a Queen Mother. The first Queen Mother then established the Hapes Consortium based on the planet of Hapes, and closed the borders of the Cluster around 3,000 BBY, which would remain thusly until 8 ABY. By the time of the New Republic, the Hapan state contained sixty-three explored star systems with inhabited worlds, although it was suspected that as many as one hundred nineteen habitable planets existed in the Cluster.

Regions
There were four distinct regions within the Cluster:


 * The Interior Region contained Hapes itself, Thrakia, Selab, and Gallinore, among others. The area was originally utilized as a base for the Lorell Raiders, and later became the first region that the first Queen Mother conquered.


 * The Rifle Worlds was so named because of an earlier attempt from several worlds of that region to secede from the Hapes Consortium. It eventually became the commerce base of the Consortium, much to the disgust and annoyance of the region's residents.


 * The Rim Worlds (not to be confused with the Outer Rim) were the systems located near the edge of the Cluster.


 * The Transitory Mists Region was mostly comprised of the Transitory Mists themselves. Most of the Hapan pirates liked to hide in this area in order to ambush unsuspecting travelers. Planets in this region include Terephon amd Shedu Maad

Known planets

 * Arabanth
 * Charubah
 * Dreena
 * Gallinore
 * Hapes
 * Kavan
 * Lorell
 * Maires
 * Olanjii
 * Reboam
 * Relephon (w/ the Relephon Moons)
 * Selab
 * Shedu Maad
 * Terephon
 * Thrakia
 * Ut
 * Vergill

Behind the scenes
In terms of real-life astrophysics, the Hapes Cluster would appear to be a star cluster of the open cluster or possibly stellar association type, while the Transitory Mists describe either an H II region and its Bok globules, or perhaps a dark nebula.

Appearances

 * The Courtship of Princess Leia
 * Young Jedi Knights: Lightsabers
 * Dark Journey
 * Destiny's Way
 * Tatooine Ghost
 * The Unifying Force
 * Bloodlines
 * Tempest
 * Exile
 * Sacrifice
 * Inferno
 * Fury
 * Revelation
 * Invincible