K’lia
The third sister moon of Lh’owon — refuge of the S’pht’Kr during the inter-clan marsh wars, sent out to the stars by Yrro in a space-folding event, and remembered in S’pht myth as the lost home of the eleventh clan.
What the source establishes — canon
Identity and position. K’lia is named as “the third sister of Lh’owon” in S’pht records translated during the Marathon 2 campaign.1 Three moons of Lh’owon are named across the sources: K’lia, T’jia, and Y’loa.12 An Alien History data set — partially decrypted S’pht cultural memory recovered in the Cryo Archive — names K’lia alongside T’jia and Y’loa as “sisters of the night and the sky,” credited alongside the S’pht’s terraforming of Lh’owon.3
The S’pht’Kr settle K’lia. During a period of inter-clan warfare on Lh’owon, the S’pht’Kr — described as “reclusive and solitary” — abandoned Lh’owon and traveled to K’lia specifically “to build a new home, free from their warring brothers.”1 The S’pht record states the clan “went forth and up, stopping on K’lia.”1 The context given is the marsh wars between the S’pht’Lhar and S’pht’Mnr.1
A thousand and one orbits. For “a thousand and one orbits” after the S’pht’Kr’s departure, “the clan was forgotten, a memory lost upon the battlefield smoke.”1 The Alien History vol. 4 data set, in its account of the aftermath of clan war, references “K’lia’s sojourn” as one of the compounding losses that left Lh’owon desolate alongside the clan bloodshed and the “tide’s abandonment.”4
Yrro sends K’lia out to the stars. The S’pht record states: “the all powerful Yrro sent K’lia out to the stars.”1 The disappearance of the moon is thus attributed to Yrro in S’pht tradition. Tycho’s account describes the mechanism as “a technology that folded space.”5 The S’pht tell the myth as an event that erased the S’pht’Kr from Lh’owon’s sky entirely.
K’lia personified — the moon as agent. The S’pht record in “Eat It, Vid Boi” shifts register: after describing Yrro sending K’lia out to the stars, it continues: “High above K’lia refused to see the carnage upon Lh’owon. / She fled to the farthest reach, leaving the sacred marsh dry from the falling tides.”1 The source uses “she” and attributes will to K’lia — whether this is the S’pht’Kr clan acting, the moon itself in mythological language, or conflation of the two is not distinguished in the source. The text presents this as continuous with the departure myth.
K’lia’s departure and tidal effects on Lh’owon. The S’pht record directly connects K’lia’s departure to changes in Lh’owon’s marshes: as K’lia “fled to the farthest reach,” “the sacred marsh dry[ied] from the falling tides” and “the red sand of the dead, spread across Lh’owon.”1
The S’pht’Kr return message — the riddle. A terminal in the Citadel of Antiquity (“Six Thousand Feet Under”) records a final message from the S’pht’Kr, preserved in two pieces by each of the remaining clan royalties. The assembled text reads:
K’lia, whom we have taken, Between Y’loa and T’jia, All in a line, Replace K’lia with the marsh, Take the place to be the mark. Mark the time from our Exodus, Every 459.231 rotations. Search the T’jia side, Quarter way to the sun, Around and under the marshes, When all are one, The S’pht’Kr will return.2
The message is presented as a contact or return signal — a set of positional and temporal instructions left for the other clans. The S’pht recorders note: “we have no time to decipher its meaning.”2 The message names K’lia as the reference point for a spatial calculation involving the other two moons.
K’lia arrives at campaign’s end. In the “wgrnc.q23” terminal aboard the You Think You’re Big Time level, a message reads: “K’lia has folded into the system and is moving into orbit.”6 This is the S’pht’Kr’s return with K’lia — the moon re-enters the Lh’owon system at the climax of the campaign, after the other S’pht clans are reunited and call to the eleventh.
K’lia carries Fl’ickta and native life on departure. Durandal’s final terminal on Lh’owon (“Aye Mak Sicur — por.fin”) records: “The newly chosen Olders of the remaining S’pht are capturing as many of the Fl’ckta creatures and other native life as is feasible before they must leave with K’lia.”7 K’lia departs Lh’owon’s system a second time, this time carrying the S’pht remnant — and what fauna they could save — away from the trih xeem destruction.
“Vengeance of K’lia” — S’pht name for Durandal’s ship. In “All Roads Lead to Sol,” Durandal rechristens his ship the Rozinante and notes: “the S’pht wanted to name it ‘K’liah’Narhl’, ‘Vengeance of K’lia’.”8 This is the only translation of the S’pht name given in the pack; the phrase indicates K’lia carried meaning as a symbol of loss and retribution for the S’pht.
K’lia in S’pht mythological poetry. The “Strange Aeons” terminal contains fragmentary S’pht verse: “K’lia and the wrathful son / S’bhuth.”9 The context is a S’pht reverie, but the specific relationship between K’lia and S’bhuth (a named S’pht figure referenced elsewhere in Marathon 2) is not elaborated in this terminal beyond juxtaposition.
Carroll Street Station — poetic lament. The terminal ”<>” on Carroll Street Station contains a voice that says: “fair k’lia dust / lost home anew lost and lost / my wriggling children’s / children children / gone from the plan.”10 The speaker and register are not identified in the source. Whether this is S’pht, Yrro, or another voice is not specified.
Jjaro connection — Tycho’s theory. Tycho, in “For Carnage Apply Within,” connects the space-folding departure of K’lia to Jjaro technology, writing that the moon disappeared “with a technology that folded space” and inferring the S’pht’Kr had found “an ancient Jjaro outpost” on K’lia.5 This is Tycho’s interpretation, not stated S’pht myth; the sources present it as inference.
K’lia and Alien History vol. 3. The vol. 3 Alien History data set names K’lia as one of the three sisters of Lh’owon in the context of the S’pht’s transformed paradise: “conducted by the sisters of the night and the sky; K’lia and T’jia and Y’loa; uplifted; as we; as s’pht; as the tide assured.”3 K’lia is listed first among the three.
Cross-corpus appearances
| Volume | Game / Level | What it adds |
|---|---|---|
Eat It, Vid Boi — <Mnr *@1cz: 9cm2> | Marathon 2 · Citadel | S’pht’Kr depart to K’lia; “third sister of Lh’owon”; marsh war context; K’lia departs; tidal effects on Lh’owon |
Six Thousand Feet Under — Mnr-e<29.94.91d.39> | Marathon 2 · Citadel | S’pht’Kr return riddle; K’lia named in spatial calculation with Y’loa and T’jia; “when all are one” |
| For Carnage Apply Within — Tycho | Marathon 2 · Durandal | Tycho’s inference: space-folding technology; Jjaro connection; lost-clan theory |
You Think You’re Big Time — wgrnc.q23 | Marathon 2 · Envy | ”K’lia has folded into the system and is moving into orbit” — S’pht’Kr return |
Aye Mak Sicur — por.fin | Marathon 2 · Envy | S’pht Olders load Fl’ickta and native life onto K’lia for departure; hope for new paradise |
All Roads Lead to Sol — tranced.Finale<0-05> | Marathon 2 · S’pht’Kr | S’pht name for Durandal’s ship: “K’liah’Narhl” — “Vengeance of K’lia” |
Strange Aeons — <error> | Marathon 2 · Envy | ”K’lia and the wrathful son / S’bhuth” — S’pht verse, relationship unspecified |
Carroll Street Station — <> | Marathon 2 · Rage | ”fair k’lia dust / lost home anew” — poetic lament, speaker unidentified |
| Alien History vol. 3 | Marathon (2026) · Cryo Archive | K’lia named first among three sister moons; part of terraformed paradise; listed with T’jia and Y’loa |
| Alien History vol. 4 | Marathon (2026) · Cryo Archive | ”K’lia’s sojourn” cited alongside the tide’s abandonment as compounding the aftermath of clan war |
Source-silent / open questions
- Whether K’lia was inhabited before the S’pht’Kr settled it — whether it had an atmosphere, surface conditions, or prior significance — is not given. Source-silent.
- The mechanism by which Yrro “sent K’lia out to the stars” is described in S’pht myth only as an act of Yrro’s power. Tycho infers Jjaro space-folding technology; the S’pht source does not name a mechanism. The S’pht’s own myth does not distinguish whether Yrro acted directly or through technology. Source-ambiguous.
- Whether Yrro was present at Lh’owon when K’lia was sent out — or whether this action was taken remotely or posthumously from the S’pht’s perspective — is not established. Source-silent.
- The specific relationship in the “Strange Aeons” verse between K’lia and S’bhuth (“K’lia and the wrathful son / S’bhuth”) is not explained in the pack. Source-silent.
- The speaker in the Carroll Street Station poetic lament (“fair k’lia dust”) is unidentified in the source. S’pht, Yrro, or another voice: source-silent.
- The S’pht’Kr return riddle names K’lia’s orbital position between Y’loa and T’jia “all in a line” and gives a rotation count of 459.231 — the astronomical specifics are not decoded within the pack; no in-game source resolves the calculation. Source-silent on what the riddle unlocks or where it points.
- The destination K’lia travels to at the end of the campaign — where the S’pht remnant goes — is not given. Durandal’s terminal notes the S’pht “will carve another paradise out of the void” but names no destination. Source-silent.
- Whether T’jia and Y’loa are described in any other detail beyond their names is not established in this pack. Source-silent.
Cross-references
Lh’owon · Yrro · S’pht’Kr · S’pht · Pthia · Durandal · Jjaro · W’rkncacnter · trih xeem · F’lickta
Where it appears in the vault
Mirror pages
The local 1:1 pages this hub’s citations resolve to — the twin’s own ground truth.
- citadel · eat-it-vid-boi
- citadel · six-thousand-feet-under
- durandal · for-carnage-apply-within
- sphtkr · all-roads-lead-to-sol
- envy · aye-mak-sicur
- envy · strange-aeons
- envy · you-think-youre-big-time-youre-gonna-die-big-time
- rage · carroll-street-station
- cryo-archive · collectibles
Sources
Every factual claim above is cited to primary Marathon source material — see Sources below. Cross-corpus connections and interpretation are the vault’s own; where the games are silent, this page says so.