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Arcturus was one of the first extra solar asteroid habitats to be settled. There are no native planets surrounding the Super Red giant star, only a few thin belts of asteroids and a
small captured planetoid which is thought to have drifted into the system 2 billion years ago.
The planetoid contained rich veins of rare Earth metals such as Rhenium and Lanthanum which have a wide range of industrial uses. The colony was formed from a multinational mining
operation run by American, Japanese and Australian corporations. Up until the mid 24th century Arcturus remained firmly in the hands of it's corporate owners. When the Japanese Imperium formed in 2200 there was some
pressure from the Japanese inhabitants who were equal in number to the combined American and Australian populations to join the Imperium. Outright conflict was avoided by providing Arcturus with its own
constitutional government that could enjoy the support of enough collective citizens across the three nationalities to ensure that the colony never became a protectorate of the Imperium. While the government was
little more than a puppet of the corporate owners to begin with, over many decades it became a fully independent state with the three owning corporations eventually selling its financial interests in the colony to
the colonists.
Today Arcturus is a major trading station, close to Earth. Because of the planetoid small size ZTT craft take very little time to reach a jump point, although to for some
destinations, starships must make repeated sling-shots around Arcturus in order to accumulate the necessary velocity.
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