Jackson's Whole

Jackson's Whole is a planet in the science fiction series "The Vorkosigan Saga" by Lois McMaster Bujold; its name comes from the Wyoming town of Jackson Hole. Originally a hijacker base, Jackson's Whole evolved into a government by a series of interlocking crime syndicates known as Houses Major and Houses Minor, the distinction being based on wealth and influence. The heads of the Houses Major, at least, are afforded the title of 'Baron,' although it is unclear which person or what institution bestows that upon them. The wife of a Jacksonian Baron is styled a 'Baronne,' in the French usage, not a Baroness. Presumably, the female leader of a House Major would also be a Baronne.

Conventional morality does not appear to matter to the planet's power brokers. Anything and everything is for sale, if the price is right. Nothing is illegal, provided you can pay for it. Furthermore, the judicial system in Jackson's Whole is based on a system of "bids" where anyone can purchase justice for the right price. Any party can purchase an arrest form for any individual. The accused party is then forced to outbid the prosecutor in order to get either bail or an acquittal.

Jackson's Whole is ultra-capitalism at work. Ordinary people are valued by their usefulness. An individual who does not live under the protection of one of the Houses has the survival prospects of a hunk of dead meat. No doubt there are those who survive in the cracks of society, but for anyone who needs a place to live and money to live on, the only choice is to be useful to some House. The only sacred institution of the planet is "The Deal"; all legal contracts are binding to a fault. Even handshake deals and verbal agreements are honored as a written contract.

The planet seems to be colder than most inhabited planets in the Nexus. Although there is an Earth-like atmosphere and thus plenty of photosynthetic life, the typical weather involves snow and ice. This is another reason individuals do not do well on the planet, as they need a warm place to live.

Jacksonians in the Vorkosigan Saga

Lord Mark Vorkosigan

Miles Vorkosigan's clone brother, created by House Bharaputra.

Taura

Another Bharaputra creation, an 8-foot-tall (2.4 m) prototype for a super-soldier with tremendous strength and deadly claws and teeth. The project was cancelled because all the prototypes (except Taura) died of premature aging when they were very young. Taura died of premature aging when she was around 30.

The Duronas

A collective of clones whose progenitor, Dr. Lily Durona, set up the group to provide biomedical services to House Fell, to reduce dependence on the other Houses. Most of the Duronas are, like the woman they were cloned from, female, and named after flowers. There are a few males, however, and they are named after birds. However, the Duronas were little more than slaves and they were rescued from the planet during the events of Mirror Dance, when Mark Vorkosigan destroyed the empire of Baron Ryoval. They began a new life on Escobar with their own lab, the Durona Group, owned equally by Lily Durona and Mark Vorkosigan, with Lily in charge of the lab and Mark running the business side of the enterprise. One of their chief goals is to create an alternative to the common Jackson's Whole enterprise of cloning elderly clients, then transplanting the brain of the elderly client into the cloned body, discarding and killing the clone's brain. Lily Durona becomes the first human trial for an experimental rejuvenation technique when her extreme age causes her death to approach. Mark Vorkosigan later orders Raven Durona to head up a new branch of the Durona Group on New Hope II/Kibou-daini to start-up a new cryo-revival business and use the planet's store of millions of frozen patients for a larger test sample of the youth-rejuvenation drug used on Lily Durona.

Hugo Canaba

Also known as Dr. Vaughn Weddell, a genetic engineer who helped create Taura, and who was extracted from House Bharaputra by the Dendarii Mercenaries because of his knowledge of a secret Cetagandan project. Weddell is the cover identity provided to him on Barrayar.

Later hired by Barrayar for research and seen again when he helps Miles prove that Simon Illyan was deliberately and maliciously infected with a memory-chip–eating virus.

Terrence Cee

Product (originally labelled as L-X-10-Terran-C) of a Cetagandan genetic project to create telepaths; the project was contracted to House Bharaputra. His story is told in (Ethan of Athos).

Barons of Jackson's Whole

Baron Fell

A notorious arms dealer. He prefers to live on the space station near a jumppoint. Despite the goods he deals in, he is considered one of the most reliable and least problematic Barons.

Baron Bharaputra

Genetics and Medical Specialist. Notorious for performing the immoral "Brain Transplant Procedure" involving the raising of a clone to young adulthood, followed by the transplant of the progenitor's brain into the clone, killing the young individual, and 50 percent of the time, the progenitor as well. The Baron's wife, Baronne Lotus, is a renegade Durona who was scheduled for the procedure when circumstance, in the form of Miles and Mark Vorkosigan, intervened, taking her clone away with the rest of the Duronas.

Baron Ryoval

Sick and twisted, this minor House Baron develops custom made slaves for the sex trade. In attempting to carry out revenge on Miles Naismith for something done by the Dendarii Mercenaries, he abducts Mark Vorkosigan by mistake. Since Mark is a trained assassin, he is eventually able to kill Ryoval, literally with both hands tied behind his back and stark naked to boot, but not before Ryoval has inflicted terrible psychological damage that causes Mark's psyche to split into multiple personalities.

Ryoval's assets were taken over by House Fell, with Mark holding Ryoval's personal code ring as hostage in the Deal that allows him to negotiate freedom for the Duronas.