Wargames
Rhulson was able to perpetrate upon the Bjaki Federation perhaps the most elaborate, impressive, and embarassing con game ever played. The Skip Drive was just becoming commonplace, promising to open the galaxy to exploration, expansion, and trade. Fleet wargames were scheduled to show off the new technology. Promising to show off radical new tactics of his own devising, "new thinking vs. old thinking", Rhulson was allowed to pick and crew two small fleets of ships to face off against each other. He hand-picked the vessels and their crews and further stocked them with a cross-section of the Federation's greatest engineers, scientists, reporters, and visionaries. Hosted in the Balinino system, Invasion/Repulsion Simulation 565A5-3  was to be a major and historical event for the Federation.

During the simulated encounter, Rhulson's forces took a surprising beating. On his Command Carrier, the Lady Sophia, he was forced to fade away from the main engagement with only the Arsenal Ship Sculpture as protection. From the opposing side, the Troop Transport Extrigent called that it would board and capture Rhulson's command ship and moved in for the kill. The destroyer Victorious was the closest to the three ships and called for the Extrigent to stand down, so it could destroy the Lady Sophia. Bjaki military protocol and, indeed, common sense itself stated that the Lady Sophia should have been boarded and captured and the Victorious should have minded its own damn business, so it's hard to completely blame Rhulson for the casualties that followed. The Victorious was captained by Ship Commander Chart Pataxi, whose socially well-positioned family saw the Bjaki Forces as little more than a glorified yacht club. His disregard for military protocol and eagerness to destroy Rhulson's ship, at least in simulation, was quietly disregarded by the Bjaki elite at the time but is looked upon by history as pathetic and tragic.

Rhulson had planned to have the Lady Sophia and Sculture fade back, to be joined by the Extrigent. He had quietly pulled strings, called in enormous favours, and planned and manipulated for months. All three were full of people who shared his views of the state of the Federation, including starship crews, scientists, artists, and their families. The critical few knew, but most did not, that Rhulson and his allies planned to steal all three ships and run like hell. As the Victorious closed, the Sculture opened up, still in simulation, with its massive railguns. When the computers on the Victorious sensed the simulated impact of the Sculpture's railguns, they shut down the ship's shields. Rhulson ordered his little fleet of 3 to come out of simulation and the Extrigent fired a volley of  missiles that crippled the Victorious' engines. As practically the entire Bjaki Federation watched in shock, the Lady Sophia, Sculture, and Extrigent stuttered into Skip Warp together and disappeared.

Whinakai Rendezvous
History records that Rhulson and his ships were in Skip Warp for about a week. During this time, he gave his historic secession speech to every member of  all three ships. He and those loyal to him were taking the three ships and leaving the Federation to start their own colony, away from bureaucracy and bloodlines, where one's own excellence and merit determined one's own fate. He acknowledged that he had essentially kidnapped those he had brought along but gave them the option of joining his mad little plan or being dropped off back in civilization. When it came time to decide, a large majority of the people he had taken decided to remain with him.

At the time of Rhulson's rebellion, the Whinakai system was still undergoing settlement. Rhulson now had ships as fast as any in the Federal Navy and arrived before news of his actions had reached the remote outpost. It came as no surprise when a small combat group of armed ships arrived in the system,  rendezvoused with the fully stocked and crewed supply and settlement ship, the Atlac. No one gave it a second thought as the four ships refueled at the system's forward supply station, dispatched several shuttles full of people that headed for the main settlement on Whinakai, then entered Skip Warp together and disappeared from the system into the void of open space.

The New Government
Rhulson insisted on two things regarding govenment. The first was that the Military, with him as its head, would be in complete charge on the voyage to their new home. The second was that the people he had chosen to come with him must form a Provisional government that would take over and lead the civilized settlement when they arrived.

Racial Diversification, the Hard Way
One of the most remarkable and formative events on the way to their new home was the encounter the Little Fleet had with a Makkuth scouting and raiding party. The Makkuth were utilizing new fast ship designs that Rhulson. Rhulson ordered his fleet out of Skip Warp and attempted to make contact with the unfamiliar ships. The Makkuth, thinking they had superior numbers and technology, attacked Rhulson's Little Fleet. Rhulson was able to capture two of the craft, the Fast Scout Hxemptre and the Deep Interceptor Dissolve. Through superior tactics and technology, he drove off or destroyed the remainder of the Makkuth force.

In itself the encounter would have been unremarkable except for the way Rhulson handled his captives. He gave his prisoners of war the choice to be dropped in a shuttle with an active distress beacon or remain with his settlement fleet. They could have their freedom, knowing that the survivors of the encounter may or may not come back for them. Or they could remain with the fleet, cast off the strict social shackles of their old empire, and gamble that they could make a place for themselves in Rhulson's new order.

More than half chose to be dropped in the shuttle but those that remained were treated well. Rather than standard containment cells, they were housed in secured crew quarters on their own familiar ships. They were allowed to appoint representatives to observe and participate with the Military and Provisional governments. Trust came slowly but it came surely. The Makkuth would not fully integrate into the Kharkosanth society until well after settlement had begun but they provided labour, ideas, and a social and technological exchange almost as soon as they joined the fleet.

NK1901
Before the wargames and hijacking ever began, Rhulson had a number of his supporters quietly looking for a planet that his new society could call home. After searching many new and old databases, after a number of inconspicuously held meetings that contained vigorous debate, the planet NK1901 was chosen.

NK1901 was an inconspicuous little planet just outside the Prodigal Void, in essentially uncharted space. Exploration craft from the Bjaki Federation had logged and studied it briefly. The planet was fully habitable and, in fact, would have been even considered desirable; however, the Bjaki scientists found that there were better places to settle first. NK1901 was just a little bit too far out of the more densely planeted Prodigal Void to be convenient. It had a thriving and well-developed ecosystem with a wide diversity of plants and evolved animals. But it was also a rugged and hostile ecosystem with a great many specialized, deadly predators. There was also a primitive but intelligent race of humanoids on the planet; a large, ugly, war-like deterrent to easy settlement.

NK1901 was a warm planet with a thick layer of greenhouse gasses. It had several large landmasses of mostly tropical forest cut across by many harsh and jagged young mountain ranges. It was quite volcanically active.  The equatorial regions were hot, stagnant and essentially uninhabitable.

Rhulson and his people chose several settlement sites on the Northeastern continent. It was the most livable and geologically stable area but also placed them right in the middle of many tribes of the native lifeforms.

The Olawasi
The Olawasi were the native lifeform present on NK1901 when Rhulson's Little Fleet arrived to settle. They are a large-framed, massively-muscled race with hairy bodies and tusked snouts. Ugly and agressive, the Olwasi had a primitive culture based on a tribal, warrior system. Rhulson was remarkable in that he neither avoided nor wiped them out. He quietly set up his settlements right in the thick of their most populous tribal empires.

The Olawasi attacked time and again, each time being repelled firmly but not excessively by Rhulson and his settlers. Rhulson would eventually go face to face with the legendary tribal leader Ystendar and, by the end of the encounter, form a fast and lasting bond with the hairy giant. Ystendar would lead his tribe in a campaign that gradually united the tribes of the planet under the banner of the Kharkosanth Empire. This encounter would gradually be linked with the assimilation of the Makkuth as a foundation on the Kharkosanth philosophy of facing an enemy and assimilating them for the greater good of both.

What's in a Name?
The Kharkosanth is a very advanced predator on NK1901. It hunts in fast packs, intelligently driving and manipulating its prey before swiftly bringing it down in a group. It adapts its tactics rapidly depending on the circumstances of the hunt. The Kharkosanth was always revered by the Olawasi as a manifestation of their god, representing cleansing, natural order, and the achievement of goals.

The settlers Rhulson had brought kept trying to convince him to name their new planet "Cyarkos" after his own first name. Rhulson kept refusing.

Shortly after his famous showdown and bonding with the Olawasi tribal leader, Ystendar invited Rhulson on a hunt. They stood on a crag and watched as a pack of Kharkosanth took down several larger, more powerful predators in a fabulous intelligent and adapting display of predatory tactics. The story goes that Rhulson smiled at Ystendar and proclaimed that the planet would be name "Kharkosanth". Ystendar smiled back and said that, no, the planet would be named "Cyarkos". The glorious empire and dynasty to follow would be called "Kharkosanth".

An Alliance of One
After a long circuitous search, the Bjaki Federation Recovery Force finally arrives almost a year after the Little Fleet begins to settle Cyarkos. Lead by now Group Captain Chart Pataxi, the Recovery Force was large enough to pose a serious threat to the Little Fleet. Pataxi showed up full of bluster and ready for conflict. After a brief stand-off, the Makkuth officers, now fully integrated into the Little Fleet's command chain, issued a communication to the Recovery Force, stating that they were members of the Makkuth Dynasty Warfleet. They claimed that Rhulson, his colony, and the Little Fleet were all allied with and under the protection of the Makkuth Dynasty and that their Warfleet would lay waste to the Bjaki outer colonies if the Recovery Force did not leave immediately and permanently. Shocked and confused, Pataxi complied. It would be many years before the Bjaki Federation determined that they had been duped. By then, the political pressure to exact revenge on Rhulson and his followers had been swept away and the Karkosanth Empire was left to grow without interference until the Bjaki-Kharko war in early Antiquity.